Little Red Lies  Casefile 6
by G.E Waldo
Summary: A lawyer must pull out all the stops to save Jane from going to jail.  NOT a re-hash of the episode with the similar theme . Some of the things that occurred in Red Matter and its sequel will be explored here.
1. Chapter 1

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 1**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. humour, and of course Jane-pain. No smut.  
><strong>Characters: <strong>Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>A lawyer must pull out all the stops to save Jane from going to jail. (NOT a re-hash of the episode with the similar theme). Some of the things that occurred in Red Matter and its sequel will be explored here.  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

"Joshua Anthony Neil." The young Sac' PD officer read the name off the dead man's driver's license. He handed the wallet with the photo ID to his partner. "That's the dead guy." He said. "Nothing else in his wallet. Looks like he's been here a while."

His partner peered into the garbage can where his fellow officer stood knee-deep in food garbage and a dead guy. The combined reek was enough to keep the seagulls away.

The officer with his feet buried in the stomach-turning scene held his nose. "This bin hasn't been emptied in weeks." He remarked, his voice nasal, his fingers pinching his nostrils shut.

His partner, standing on the jutting edge of the bin, his toes balanced on the square metal tubes where the truck's hooks would go to lift the five hundred pound green container, shrugged. "This restaurant's been closed for a month. Maybe they didn't pay their bill?"

"The killer was probably counting on this guy being hauled away the next day." The corpse's skin was grey and mottled. There were three gun-shot wounds to the center of his chest. "He died quick."

"Well, they counted wrong. And the poignant word is died. In other words, dead or die – leave it to the medical guys to reason why. Who called it in anyway?"

"Anonymous." The officer in the bin frowned, continuously irritated at his partner's penchant for off-the-cuff poetry.

"Oh - anonymous. I like anonymous. Less complicated."

"Oh – what do we have here?" The first officer reached beneath the body and withdrew a long barrelled pistol by its trigger guard, dangling it from his latex-gloved index finger. "Do you see a gun in my hand, Mitch? Because I sure see a gun."

"What did I tell ya'?" His partner said, his own uniform unsoiled, "less complicated. Gotta' love less complicated."

CBI

"We need to speak to Agent Patrick Jane."

Lisbon's morning coffee and report reading was interrupted by the appearance of the two plain-clothes detectives at her office door. One was a tall red head in need of a haircut and the other shorter man, a balding brunette. Both wore sober expressions particular to their kind and both were dressed in grey suits and raincoats that silently announced _We are the Law._

Lisbon stood, extending her hand courteously. "I'm Agent Lisbon. Patrick Jane is a consultant here. What's the problem?"

The taller of the two men, the red-head, shook her hand. "I'm Detective Lanslow and this is Detective Semeniuk."

Lisbon acknowledged both their names with a quick nod. "And why do you need to speak to Jane?"

"You're his supervisor?"

"Yes." More sharply "What's this about?"

Lanslow continued. "We should speak in private."

Lisbon's mood was swiftly shifting from polite cooperation to exasperation. "And you can certainly do that once you've answered my question."

Detective Semeniuk answered. "It's about a dead body, Agent Lisbon."

Lisbon felt a familiar gnawing fear awaken in her belly. _What dead body?_ stood on the tip of her tongue but it was probably simpler to just find Jane.

Jane was in the kitchen, drinking one of his noxious teas and chatting with Rigsby who was nursing coffee from a massive metal travel mug.

"Jane?"

Jane looked up with mild curiosity at the two men who were accompanying Lisbon. "Morning Lisbon."

She jerked an uncertain thumb back at the two men standing behind her. "These detectives need to speak with you in my office. Now please."

Jane took up his tea cup, still nearly full, bringing it with him. He threw Rigsby slightly raised eyebrows - his only comment.

Lisbon ushered them all inside and closed the door. "Sit down." She said to Jane gesturing to the chair in front of her desk. The detectives remained standing.

Lisbon looked at the men standing ominously on either side of Jane. Jane ignored them and sipped his tea.

Detective Lanslow took the floor. "Mister Jane, do you know a man named Joshua Anthony Neil?"

Jane shook his head. "No, should I?"

"Well your gun was found beneath his dead body yesterday afternoon."

Lisbon's guts heaved. She sat back in her chair, her muscles suddenly drained of strength. It couldn't be true. Jane didn't own a gun. He hated guns. "There must be some mistake." Lisbon said to the detectives, resisting the urge to cross her fingers or beg God to put a halt to this before it got another foothold.

Although his face betrayed no stray emotion other than surprise, Jane's complexion had blanched white. It not only meant he had been taken by surprise by the news but that it had put a small fear into him and it was all Lisbon needed to recognise that somewhere here there was a truth Jane knew but she didn't. And it forced her to ask the question "Do you...own a _gun_, Jane?"

Jane met her eyes. "Yes."

Lisbon would have preferred a lie. For once Jane had spoken the bald truth to her and why did it have to be about something like this? Goddamn his quest for revenge and all the secrecy that went with it. Goddamn him for putting himself in this spot, and _her_. Still ever hopeful "But you didn't shoot anyone."

He shook his head once. "No. I have not shot anyone."

It sounded purely truthful, so no random murder on his conscience then. At least she knew him _that _well enough.

"Anyone since Timothy Carter you mean?" Semeniuk corrected.

Jane nodded. "Exactly."

Detective Lanslow said "The gun in question was originally registered to Jack Coleman, so we're assuming you either borrowed or purchased it from him."

Jane drained his tea cup, setting the china-wear on the corner of Lisbon's desk. "Neither. It was a gift."

"Wait a second." Lisbon said. "Why do you think it was Jane who shot this man Joshua?"

Detective Semeniuk explained dryly. "Because the gun was found with Mister Jane's finger-prints on it, under the body of the dead man - a man who's been dead for weeks, actually."

Semeniuk looked down at Jane. "Coleman gave _you _the gun?"

"Yes." Jane said.

"_You_? Another guy bent on revenge, someone who has been hunting down the killer who murdered his family now owns _that_ gun. Joshua Neil was a petty thug with a rap sheet five feet long for robbery and assault. And we're supposed to believe you didn't pull the trigger?"

Jane kept his eyes on his tea cup. "Well, he could have chosen a more socially constructive career I suppose but that's no reason for me to kill him. So, no, I did not shoot him."

"This really is very interesting." Semeniuk looked at Lisbon. "Wouldn't you say this is interesting, Agent Lisbon?"

Lisbon couldn't even form a response, except to ask Jane. "Jane, just tell me you didn't kill this man."

Jane answered her straight. "I'm _not_ lying. I didn't kill him."

He seemed sincere. He looked it even. But then Jane was a master at that stuff – looking one way and thinking another – and then _doing_ another. Conning people was Jane's expertise.

Detective Lanslow explained to Lisbon "Well, the evidence says otherwise. Talking to you in private was just a courtesy in case Mister Jane here came up with a plausible explanation but based on what we've heard, we have no choice but to arrest Mister Jane on suspicion of murder."

Jane stood and they placed the cuffs on him. With a faint hope Lisbon asked "Jane, when did he give you the gun? Mister Coleman - when was that?"

"Over a year ago."

Lisbon looked down at her desk and the forgotten paperwork. "I see." She looked up at him again, trying to see what was behind his eyes. "Do you have a lawyer?"

Jane shook his head. "I don't need one. I haven't done anything."

Semeniuk opened the door to lead his suspect out.

"Well, get one, Jane." Lisbon insisted. "In fact I'll call one for you."

Jane did not respond as he was led away. Lisbon looked into the bullpen where Rigsby, Van Pelt, Cho and a half dozen other agents watched the show. Lisbon waved her team in to her office. It was time for some brain-storming.

CBI

Gale Selby, attorney-at-law, had been told much about her newest client, Patrick Jane, from his CBI agent friend, and then had spent a considerable time reading much more about him on her own via the internet and, as it turned out, his case-file relating to the Red John serial killer murders, two of the victims having been Jane's wife and daughter. All of it together had made for some very interesting reading to say the least. The Red John aspect, Jane's career paths before, and since, the loss of his family would have made a best-selling John Grisham novel.

As for Jane's character itself...

Selby did not like making judgements without first getting to know the person who she would be defending. But she expected friction and maybe even some fireworks from Patrick Jane. Everything she had thus far learned about him pointed in that direction.

"Mister Jane?"

From behind the barred window, Patrick Jane looked nothing like she had expected. Remarkably in all her readings about the man she had not once come across his photo. Teresa Lisbon had described it as camera modest but Selby had seen through that excuse at once. It was not fear of the camera so much as the terror of reprisal. Once bitten, twice shy.

From a purely aesthetic perspective, no cheap ID photo would have done him justice. Patrick Jane appeared as one might expect a former performer to appear and did not possess a face that bespoke a career in law enforcement. But what he did possess in the way of looks was for certain extremely attractive. Easy on the eyes - a real _looker_, possessing an evenly featured face with tragic eyes who was probably chatted up and flirted with everywhere he went. Simply put, Patrick Jane was gorgeous.

Though his curly blonde, barely tamed hair and easy smile gave one an immediate impression of youth, it was when one got up close that the lines the years had begun to etch around his eyes became evident. One then also noticed that the corners of his mouth turned south as though stuck in time, a perpetual frozen grief. And although at first appearance he exuded an easy confidence, there existed undercurrents of sadness and uncertainty, as though Jane understood that he was due certain punishments in this life and had just been soundly reminded of that, and that one of those life-notices had just greeted him _fist_ to face.

Jane was still wearing his street clothes, though that description did not quite fit. Under his expensive suit jacket Patrick Jane wore a neatly pressed, matching vest. It gave him an air of the Las Vegas show-man, or the image of a man ready to attend a formal function somewhere. Selby wondered if the choice in clothing was habitual or deliberately chosen to render just the effect she had supposed. Either way, there was no doubt that he looked good in it.

Jane was supposed to be one of the best crime solvers in Sacramento County. If it were true, Selby wondered how he had managed to get himself mixed up in a murder charge complete with smoking gun. These were things she hoped to find out over the next few weeks.

Gale Selby pulled out the metal chair the Remand Center guard had provided for her so she could speak to her client across the table. On his side, Jane's hands were cuffed to an attached ring on the edge of the table. He had circles under his eyes and she wondered if he had slept. Being arrested did tend to interfere with shut-eye.

She opened her file folder, turning to a yellow pad for note-taking. "Hello Patrick. My name is Gale Selby, I'm your attorney."

He nodded once. It was a bare dip of his head. "Lisbon said you'd be along."

Lisbon. That was his supervisor at the CBI, the woman she had spoken to at length and who had thoroughly warned her that, among other things, Patrick Jane might not be cooperative. That he was highly intelligent but argumentative to the very last. He was also stubborn, cocky, needlessly reckless when it came to his own safety, an accomplished liar and con artist, and too sure of himself even when it was in his worst interest to be so. Plus about a dozen other cautions had been offered as to his unbendable nature. Unsurprisingly then, Jane already sounded as though he doubted her abilities.

"Yes." Selby said. "And as you are a man with a problem, I am here to get you out of that problem."

"They have a circumstantial case and I have alibis. I work almost every day..."

"But not_ every_ day." She reminded him.

He admitted to the table top. "No."

"And you have a prior trial on a similar charge – making this an even more difficult case. That coupled with your disregard for the law, etc, etc - yes, I am aware of these things."

"I don't need your services. I'll conduct my own defence."

Selby expected as much. "I've read the Tim Carter trial transcripts. You defended yourself, _fairly_ competently, and you won – but it was a lucky break." She stared at him, both her expression and words blunt. "That's all, Patrick, just a lucky break."

"I disagree. Don't bother trying to talk me into this. I'll do fine on my own."

"Really? Did you at least know enough to keep your mouth shut when the locals questioned you without your lawyer – _me_ – in the room? When the detectives patted you on the back and told you not to worry? That they were there to help because they such good guys who are only looking out for you and to just tell them everything you know?"

Jane looked away, sighing.

"Right." Selby dropped her pen and closed the folder. She leaned back and crossed her arms, regarding him for a moment. "Patrick, let me say this plainly. I spent fifteen years as a prosecuting attorney and the only reason you won the Tim Carter case is because the assistant DA at the time who tried you was a bum, and not just a bum but an overworked bum. You won because he was a lousy lawyer and because you managed to _just _squeak the jury's sympathy over to your corner.

"And just for your information, I'm a con artist too only my name-tag says_ Attorney_, not _Patrick Jane_. If you intend to go into that courtroom and defend yourself, I promise you a twenty year sentence of cosy showers and playing house-wife for guys a whole lot bigger and smellier than you."

Selby sighed, pursing her lips at the man that was turning out to be everything his boss said he was. "Or you can listen to what I have to say and maybe, just maybe when this is all over, you can go back to your job and your colleagues and your super-hero quest for revenge."

Patrick Jane jiggled his cuffs a little. Evidently they were giving him some discomfort.

Selby called through the door. "Can we get these cuffs off him? He's not going anywhere."

The guard turned a key in the door and swung it open. He entered and twisted another key in the cuffs. They fell off.

"Thank you." Selby said as the guard retreated, locking the door again behind him.

Jane subconsciously massaged his wrists, all the while looking at the wall. For all his talents as to the con' and his legendary mind-tricks, at the present time he was not performing or playing her. Gone was the smarmy self-assurance she'd glimpsed upon arriving. His emotions were stark naked. Right now Patrick Jane was scared.

"What makes you think you can help me at all?" He asked. "They found my finger prints on the gun."

"With their case as strong as it appears your only defence is not guilty by reason of temporary insanity."

His face changed immediately. Suddenly he was deeply insulted and angry. "I'm _not_ insane."

"If you say so, but we need to convince a jury otherwise, and this is going to trial by the way - you've been _charged_, Patrick. Your arraignment is tomorrow and temp' insanity is your only hope for a defence."

He was sceptical. "When was the last time anyone even tried that defence?"

"Years and years but that doesn't make it any less plausible. You got a better idea?"

"Find out who really killed him."

"And who would that be? Any ideas?"

Strangely Jane, the man of many ideas, was silent.

"No? No ideas? They found a scraping of your blood on the underside of his belt buckle – did you know that? So tell me again that you never met this guy, Mister Jane while remembering that I'm not an idiot. And those detectives who arrested you, they're not idiots either. We all know you're lying, but it's not going to be about lies or truth, it's about who will run the best con in the court room."

"I didn't _kill_ him."

"So you _do_ know him." Selby read between the lines. She wondered how much of that she was going to have to do with this client. "We'll come back to that later. In the meantime I have an idea - how about we ask the judge, who is also not an idiot, for a year or so to investigate this phantom other shooter ? His Honour's probably a nice guy too - what do you think he'll say?"

Jane looked away to the wall again. Selby wondered what he saw there that didn't exist on the table between them. "So - _not guilty by reason of insanity_ then. We're agreed?"

Jane nodded but Selby expected he only did so because he as yet saw no other options. It didn't mean he wasn't going to look for them, or solicit his team to look for him. Selby also had an intuitive feeling that on the choice of defence Jane would fight her every step of the way.

"Good. I'll see you at the arraignment." Selby said and stood.

CBI

Selby spotted two members of Jane's CBI colleagues sitting in the audience, the young woman and the shorter dark-haired fellow: Van Pelt and Cho. Rumour had it that Jane and Cho were involved as more than colleagues. She would need to discuss the implications of that with Jane prior to trial. Her lawyer opponent would be sure to bring it up and try to twist it into a character flaw.

Jane's supervisor, Lisbon, was absent. No doubt she was busy trying to put out the fire with her own boss over Jane's unexpected arrest. The media would be having a field day - _CBI Consultant Patrick Jane Arrested for the Second Time on a Charge of Murder!_ A shit-storm for any in the CBI with political aspirations.

The judge listened as both sides presented their evidence and arguments for and against. He set the trial for two months hence, banged his gavel and called for whoever was next on the docket.

Selby watched Cho follow Jane from the court room with his eyes. Jane would be spending the night in jail until he came through with his bail of two million.

Patrick Jane was the former psychic wonder boy and current wonder consultant and his reputations preceded him. From what she'd managed to gather from Lisbon and his personal history, money just seemed to effortlessly appear in his hands. Selby was curious how Jane would manage to raise that amount. Hopefully through legal means, or close to it. Somehow, though, she didn't doubt he would manage it.

Selby spent the next day getting subpoenas ready for her numerous witnesses and experts. There were dozens of testimonies to go over with each of them, and of course, with Jane. She also had to prepare each of them for the questions the prosecution might ask and how to respond without hanging themselves or her client. And how to handle the stress of being in the stand and badgered by her opponent. The former Assistant DA may have been a bum, but the new one - Henry Williams was not. Williams would use every trick at his disposal to reduce Jane in the jury's eyes to a cold-blooded killer who shot Joshua Neil down with no twinge of morals or conscience.

Her job was to convince them otherwise. Her job was to convince them that Patrick Jane, although he did shoot Joshua, did so while out of his mind. While insane. She had her work cut out for her.

CBI

Part 2 soon


	2. Chapter 2

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 2**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. humour, and of course Jane-pain. No smut.  
><strong>Characters: <strong>Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>A lawyer must pull out all the stops to save Jane from going to jail. (NOT a re-hash of the episode with the similar theme). Some of the things that occurred in Red Matter and its sequel will be explored here.  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

"_You will pay for that one. You alone, little love, you alone. Just you, j-u-u-u-st you, yo-o-o-u-u-u-u-u..."_

Jane awoke with a start.

"Hey _you!"_ The guard outside his cell door said, banging his stick against the steel bars. "Get up. You've got a visitor."

Jane sat up and watched as Lisbon entered his holding cell. "I figured I'd pay you a visit before I get subpoenaed and can't." She said, sitting down on the opposite jail-standard single cot.

Jane nodded, pressing his lips together.

Lisbon sat stiffly. The cot was not uncomfortable but she suddenly found her back aching and her lungs short of air. It was difficult finding anything to say that wouldn't irreparably hurt them both. "You lied to me."

Jane clasped his hands together and rested his elbows on his knees. He leaned forward as though his words had weight. "Technically I didn't."

"You had a gun, Jane, and never told me or anyone. Did you even bother to get a license?"

"Didn't seem like a good idea, I was planning on using it to kill Red John."

"But you kept it from me."

"Why would I tell you?"

That made Lisbon pause. "I thought we were friends?"

"We are, but our friendship doesn't change my plans for revenge."

"You hate guns. You don't even know how to load a gun or shoot one."

"I shot one once."

Lisbon remembered. Jane had saved her life. "You fired from the hip, Jane, and that was a shot-gun blast from fifteen yards. It was blind luck that you even hit Hardy."

"It was enough to stop him."

Lisbon turned her head aside, not wishing her gratitude to him for being alive today to cloud what she wanted to say or alter what she was feeling. "I wish you'd told me."

"What would you have done? I wanted to protect you and the team. I don't want anyone going down for something that only involves me. It's _my_ revenge. No one else needs to get hurt."

Lisbon shook her head. Four years. Four years and he still didn't get it. "If killing Red John meant one of us had to die, would you still do it? Would you still seek your revenge?"

"I will not be drawn into a hypothetical scenario that has no basis in reality. When the time comes, I will kill him on my own."

Lisbon laughed - an ironic, disappointed cough. "We're already involved, Jane – _god_ - how can you not _see _that? We're involved because we care about you and because we don't want to see you dead. You think any one of us will back off at the last gasp so you can keep a clear conscience while he slashes your throat?"

"Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"He's gotten to you twice already. What makes you think three times won't be a charm? Where in god's name do you get this hubris? You can barely defend yourself as it is – I seem to remember you showing up at CBI with the crap beaten out of you and your throat cut. You think Red John will just stand idly by and let you kill him?"

"I'll do what I have to."

She'd heard the same from him before. His desire for revenge was uncompromising and water-tight, his plan for bringing it about was naked brittle bones. "That might include dying. You won't be around to enjoy your little vengeance."

Jane looked at the floor. "When I get out of this – _if_ I get out of this - I'm quitting the CBI, and then Red John will leave you alone."

Lisbon really did look disappointed then. She couldn't help it, her eyes filled up. "How dare you - you selfish bastard." She said, staring at him. They all had come to care about him, caring enough in fact to protect him, more than once risking their lives and careers to help him. "You ungrateful son-of-a-bitch. How _dare_ you treat us like we are nothing to you, like how _we_ feel about it doesn't matter." One, two tears rolled down either cheek. "You selfish_ bastard_!"

Lisbon stood and banged on the bars. "Hey. Lemm' out! I'm done here." She glanced back at him. "I'm _done_."

"_Lisbon_." Jane said to her back and despite herself, Lisbon stopped in her tracks.

The soft plea in his voice made her halt her hurrying feet that wanted to go somewhere away from him to cry out her helpless rage at how blind he was to them. To shed the resolute love and the foolish sympathy that even _she_ felt for him – even now, with their futures under scrutiny and his in pieces.

"_What?"_

"Will you come to the trial?"

As much as she'd like to despise him, he was still her friend. Over the years Jane had woven his weird little ways into their lives and hearts and it was impossible to excise him now. She herself still loved the crazy bastard, too deeply most times for it to be healthy. "When I can I'll be there. Whenever the job lets me."

"Thank you." He said to her retreating back.

CBI

Opening statements were read.

Henry Williams, the prosecution had the first stab at the hearts of the jury. He spoke long and thorough about premeditation and the sins of personal revenge. He underlined the facts of whose fingerprints were on the gun and where it was found; about the ballistics and matching the bullets to the slugs found in the body, he lectured on the importance for them - as the jury - to keep objective and to not allow their personal feelings or the feelings of others cloud their judgement or impede justice. He spoke of reason and intelligence, about doing the right thing though it may condemn – not unjustly - a man to prison. Henry finished with an assurance that the evidence, as he would show, pointed only to one man, and that the accused, Patrick Jane, had offered no plausible explanation as to who might have shot Joshua Neil other than himself. He promised to show them the accused was a liar and a con artist by trade, a man who – not-with-standing he had worked within the CBI for more than four years – still practiced criminal art as a matter of course – it was practically in his _nature _to lie. Williams wrapped it up with an appeal to the jury's good sense and intelligence, and to see that justice be done.

Gale Selby rose and walked to the jury box. For the trial she had her long brunette hair pulled back in a bun that tightened her highly arched eyebrows and sharp cheekbones into a rather severe expression. When she addressed the jury her hazel eyes spoke hard for justice yet appealed to their collective humanity. "We, the Defence of the accused, are not here to deny any facts about this case that may already have been proven_ scientifically_. We are also not here to discuss how the accused is innocent until proven guilty. I would not presume to think you so unsophisticated. You know all the axioms. You are aware of the constitution and that every man or woman must have their day in court."

Selby walked back and forth with her palms held loosely together, rubbing them now and again as though in her gentle hands – and by extension – theirs, a man's freedom rested. As though this case was not for her or even for Patrick but for the jury to take up and examine in their own good hands, minds and hearts. They would decide their peer's fate and not Williams or her or even the judge. They were also her allies and colleagues and the ones to whom she would look for guidance. It was an emotional strategy that had worked well in the past. "We are here – with our defence as you are already aware – to show that Patrick Jane is not guilty by reason of insanity – and before you get that look in your eye, I think in the end you will find yourselves agreeing with me on that stand. As you know, as any person of reasonable intelligence knows, there is more to a human being than science and more to the motivations and passions inside a human heart than a single moment in time. There is more to Patrick Jane than the label The Accused. We do not deny the obvious - that the dead man was murdered is no mystery but what _is_ in doubt, what_ is_ still a mystery are the whys. Have you asked yourself that?

"After listening to my distinguished colleague, have you asked yourself questions beyond the obvious? Why did Patrick Jane pull that trigger? As far as we have been able to determine Patrick and Joshua never even _met_. There has been some suggestion by Patrick himself that he was framed and that may be, but if that is _not _so, why would Patrick Jane wish to kill a perfect stranger? If you have not asked yourselves these questions, I urge you to do so now most carefully.

"Mister Williams would have you believe that because Patrick was on trial for a similar charge –shooting a man - that it only makes sense that he might shoot another - _but does it_? Patrick knew who that man was, it was a sensational case - you all read about it: a man seeking revenge on the killer for the brutal murder of his family. I would like to remind you that Patrick was found _not guilty_ of that crime. Not guilty. Properly tried by a jury of his peers and found _Not. Guilty._

"As with any close examination of an event involving human beings, you will shortly come to see that there is far more to _this _event than meets the eye, there is far more here than an accused and a dead man - _much_ more. So what is it? What at the present time hides beyond our vision that could explain why Patrick Jane lost his senses and shot Joshua Neil down? What unknowns conceal themselves in the shadows which we must ferret out?

"Here's a question for you: Why did Patrick accept that gun as a gift? And another: Why did he use his own gun to shoot a man and then carelessly leave it behind at the scene? _Beneath _the body remember. Who shoots and then tries to hide the body but then leaves behind the gun with his own fingerprints on it? My god, it's ludicrous. Mister Williams would have you believe that this crime was premeditated and deliberate, that it was carefully planned. But what I have described, what the evidence shows, is no plan at _all_. I must confess, for an alleged premeditated murder supposedly committed by a cold, unfeeling genius, this crime is a complete contradiction in logic. To put it plainly, it's a bloody mess."

Polite laughter from the jury and onlookers greeted her gentle humour.

"Still, if my client did shoot Joshua Neil, questions remain: If these two men had never met, what _possible_ motivations would compel Patrick to put his entire life and freedom at risk to shoot a _total stranger_? What a terrible turn such an act would take a distinguished career such as his within the CBI. Patrick Jane has worked tirelessly for this community, for me and you and your families, for over four years tracking down killers and solving homicides – working every day to make Sacramento County and even California safer places to live. It is my personal belief that anyone who would work day and night to help victims get the relief they need through bringing criminals to justice, that man _in his heart_ harbours a heightened sense of what is right.

"What reward, besides a small pay-check – and believe me, I checked - it's pathetic, what our law-enforcement specialists earn...so what reward for risking his life? What reward for sleepless nights and well deserved but almost never given praise? What reward but for the citizenry's often public criticism that he or they were too slow, or too careless? What_ personal_ reward might there be other than the satisfaction of seeing justice done? What reward would feel right to _you_ if you were the one risking your life every week? What is _your_ life worth? Ladies and gentlemen, we are the sum of what we believe and practice and give of ourselves. What has Patrick Jane given? And so what will you give him?

"That is what I intend to show you today. I intend for you to have the entire picture of Patrick Jane, and not just the crime snap-shots encased in a fingerprint, a gun, or a dead man. As his fellow compassionate human beings, I believe he is at least owed our full attention to what lies in his heart. We owe it to justice and to compassion to hear him out. To learn all there is to know of his _sum_."

Selby stopped her pacing and folded her hands in front of her, looking at each individual member of the jury. "Please hear him out carefully, and with a willing mind free of preconceptions. I know you would wish no less for yourself or your loved one. Please use your good sense and compassion not only for what is just but for what is _right_."

CBI

Selby sat down and was gratified that two members of Jane's CBI homicide team were in attendance, sitting side-by-side about two rows behind Jane. Selby recognised the tall, angular faced fellow – Agent Wayne Rigsby and the pretty red-headed woman Agent Grace Van Pelt, the younger and least experienced of the team. Selby had taken some time to read up on them as well, whatever she'd been able to get her hands on. These two had once had an in-office romance than had ended, Rigsby ending up the dump-ee. He was cursed with a criminal ex-con for a father; He had spent two years with SF PD Arson Unit and now five years of excellent service with CBI Homicide.

Grace Van Pelt had come from a wealthy sports-hero-dad background but had chosen to serve her community through police work – and interesting choice for a princess, one that spoke to her desire to make it on her own merit and not on daddy's shirt-tails or credit card.

The other agents Selby had taken some extra time to delve into. Kimball Cho, an unusual name for an unusual fellow. Former baseball hopeful, former gang-member, former juvenile delinquent, former army guy, now a homicide cop with a high profile but low budget crime-fighting agency. And now also Patrick Jane's lover. It was quite a resume'.

And then there was Teresa Lisbon, the leader of this curious little policing troupe, a fair but tough female barely passed thirty years old who, at five foot-three and ninety-six pounds, somehow worked a secret magic that inspired in her underlings a fierce and abiding loyalty. Selby suspected that Patrick Jane occupied a special place in Lisbon's tightly locked up feelings. It was probably the reason the man was often in so much hot water to begin with; Teresa Lisbon granted him professional freedoms she would not have offered to her own mother.

Selby believed that Lisbon, on some level she was not ready or willing to admit, loved the man. Had they ever slept together? Nothing she had learned so far convinced her of it, but there was no telling what lay ahead for those two hot-headed, walled-in people.

The prosecution had the stand. Henry Williams had in turn the investigating officers in the seat and was asking them about their discovery of Joshua Neil's body and some generalities of the crime scene. It was all perfunctory stuff that needed to be said.

To the judge Selby politely said no thank-you to any cross-examination. They were simple facts. Nothing needed to be added or taken away.

Williams called Detective Semeniuk to the stand as his next witness for the prosecution and asked the detective to state his full name, address and occupation for the jury.

"Thank-you, Detective. Now Detective Semeniuk – do you recall the case of Jack Coleman?"

"Yes. Jack Coleman was a man who tried to kill an ex-con by the name of Billy Mock. The ex had been accused of the rape and murder of Mister Coleman's wife."

"We are aware of the results of that case, Mister Coleman was acquitted of murder being that the victim was already dead but what we are interested in is the weapon used in that attempt – do you remember what make and model of weapon it was?"

"Yes. It was a long-barrelled Glock that held twelve rounds in its clip. The serial number is on file and it is still registered to Jack Coleman. It's in my notes right here." Semeniuk reached inside his coat pocket.

"That's fine, detective, I'm sure your report was thorough. This gun was originally registered to Jack Coleman, is that right?"

Semeniuk left his notes where they were. "Yes."

"And what did Jack Coleman do with this gun?"

"According to Jack Coleman's statement to the police and to us, he gave it to Mister Patrick Jane."

"The man accused of murder who is sitting in this court room today?"

"Yes."

"At the crime scene where the body of Joshua Neil was found, was this gun also discovered there?"

"Yes. It was stashed beneath the body."

"The forensics," Williams sated, "we will be hearing from in a moment in greater detail but Detective Semeniuk, in your opinion, as a crime investigator with some twenty years experience, what conclusions did you make as to who might have shot Joshua Neil?"

"It seems to me there was only one conclusion to make: that Patrick Jane, the owner of the weapon, shot and killed Joshua Neil. There were no other prints on the gun and no other suspects have come to light."

Williams spoke in mock protest. "But how can that be when we have been told by the defence that Patrick Jane didn't even _know_ the dead man?"

The detective rolled his eyes. "He could be lying. In twenty years, I've yet to meet a criminal who _didn't_ lie about something. And murderers are the worst of all. They don't want to be caught – so they lie."

Williams nodded as though, yes, that did make a lot of sense. "Thank-you, Detective Semeniuk." Williams spoke to the judge, His Honour Judge Gilpin. "I have no more questions for this witness at this time, your Honour."

Gilpin, a white-haired grey-faced sober-looking man asked Selby "Counsellor – do you wish to cross?"

Selby stood, taking a sheet of paper with her. "Yes, your Honour." She approached Detective Semeniuk. "Detective, you stated..." She checked her notes, and read from the detective's follow-up report that included the preliminary forensics "that the gun had, according to the forensics, Patrick Jane's fingerprints on the handle and on the barrel." She looked up at him. "What about the bullets?"

"The bullets?"

"Yes, the bullets. If Patrick Jane was the one who loaded the weapon, stands to reason he would have his fingerprints on the bullets as well, wouldn't you agree?"

"I would agree. The forensics should have discovered that, if there were any."

"The preliminary report does not say so one way or the other, so barring a shoddy forensic work-up do you have any idea why Jane's fingerprints would be on the handle and the barrel but not on the bullets themselves?"

"You would have to ask them, Misses Selby."

"_Ms_. - and yes I will. But for now I'm asking for your professional opinion – would you expect to find, if an accused fingerprints are on the barrel of the gun and on the handle of the gun, that his fingerprints would also be found on the bullets in the gun? Is that a reasonable conclusion to make in your opinion as a professional investigator?"

"Reasonable - yes, but inevitable - no. Sometimes - often actually - only smudges are recovered from bullets."

"But it is odd, isn't it for, according to this report, forensics to not have discovered even a smudge on any of the remaining nine bullets found in the clip of the gun?"

The detective shrugged. "If you're looking for weird cases, I've seen weirder."

"Do you also find it, to use your words, weird that the fingerprints of the man who owns a gun to be located on the gun?"

Detective Semeniuk frowned. "I'm not sure I understand the question."

"Well, Mister Jane _owned_ the gun. He had it in his possession for over a year before it was discovered under Joshua Neil's body, it should not surprise us that his fingerprints were found on a gun he had at one point handled. Does _that_ seem odd to you, Detective?"

"Not odd - no. But as I've said, I've seen stupider things done by a murderer than leaving his own fingerprints on a gun used to shoot someone."

Selby cleared her throat. The detective had given her the first sharp claw with which to strike. Semeniuk had done a thing no good investigator should do, especially not in a court room – he had gotten personal. "You think Mister Jane is a stupid man, Detective Semeniuk? He defended himself at his own trial and was found not guilty - does that come across to you as something a stupid man could accomplish?"

Without giving him time to respond, Selby forged ahead to drive the point home. "Would a consultant working the tough cases with CBI homicide be a stupid individual, Detective? Would a stupid man be able to raise two million dollars for his bail from inside a jail cell? Would the Sacramento Police Department and the State of California have wished to award Patrick Jane a Bronze Medal of Valour for saving the life of his supervisor or have wanted to grant him a distinguished service award if he was just any idiot?"

The detective hurried to correct what he saw as her incorrect assumption. "Patrick Jane's not a _policeman_. He could not have received the medals you're talking about."

"No, of course not but that is a mere technicality. Jane is only a consultant, but never-the-less a formal commendatory note _was _made on his permanent record regarding both. He saved his boss's life and for four years has served this county and State with excellence. I think we can all agree, Detective Semeniuk, that Patrick Jane is not a moron. And it seems incredible to me that a man who is not a moron, a man who is_ this_ level of _not _being as moron, would be so careless as to leave his own fingerprints on his own gun beneath the body of his victim so he could be easily discovered and arrested."

"Ms. Selby, you haven't worked a homicide case from beginning to end. You don't know how weird it can get or how smart people can sometimes do stupid things. So if you'll forgive me for being blunt that's just _your_ opinion. It doesn't hold much water out in the real world."

"Yes, it is my opinion. It is my _professional_ opinion, and I think would probably be most persons. And as for trying or defending criminal cases for twenty years in the real world, both the stupid and the smart ones, detective,_ my_ opinion holds water as tightly as a drum."

Selby returned to her seat at the table for the defence. "No further questions your Honour."

CBI

"Counsellor for the Prosecution – your next witness please." Judge Gilpin said, encouraging things to move right along.

"The prosecution calls Jack Coleman to the stand." Williams smiled briefly at his witness, and Jack Coleman buttoned his suit jacket as he took the center seat, stating his name and other information.

Henry Williams leaned against the witness stand and spoke pleasantly. "Mister Coleman you are the man who gifted the Glock – the murder weapon in question – to Mister Patrick Jane approximately one year ago?"

"Yes."

Williams walked to a long side table where various items lay and took up a hand-gun in a tagged, sealed plastic bag. He brought it to Coleman for inspection. "Is this the weapon?"

Coleman took a few seconds to examine it and nodded. "Yes, that is - er _was -_ my gun."

"May I ask what you and Patrick talked about that day?"

"At the time, Patrick Jane was investigating the murder case of Billy Mock and we discussed that. We also spoke of my personal history..."

"The, if you'll forgive me, rape and murder of your wife?"

"Yes. And Patrick seemed very interested in the way I handled it; that I had forgiven the killer."

"I see. At what point did you decide to come clean with the investigators which included Patrick?"

Coleman appeared a little uncomfortable. "Well, uh, Patrick played a very good ruse on us, using accusations against my son to force a confession from _me_. It was after they dismissed the charges against me that I gave him the gun."

"I see. And what did you discuss at _that_ time?"

"Mister Jane asked me whether it had been worth it."

"Whether or not what had been worth it?"

"All the years of waiting and plotting to get revenge against the killer of my wife." Coleman showed no sign of remorse. "I told him yes. I said yes. It had been worth every sacrifice I had made."

"And do you believe Patrick was thinking of murder?"

"Objection." Selby said and stood. "Counsel is asking the witness to draw conclusions your honour. Does Mister Coleman read minds?"

The judge nodded and Williams raised his hand in surrender. "Withdrawn your Honour. I'll rephrase. Mister Coleman in your opinion only, why do you think Patrick Jane accepted that gun?"

Coleman looked a little uncomfortable now and shifted in his seat. "I suspected he had a score of his own to settle, that's just the impression I got of course."

Williams nodded and thanked him. He said to Selby. "Your witness, Counsellor."

Selby walked to the stand, all business. "Mister Coleman, did Patrick in fact open the box when you gave it to him?"

Coleman was forced to think for a few seconds. "N-no, no, actually, I don't think he did. He thanked me and I left."

"So Patrick had no way of knowing what was in that box when he accepted it, did he?"

"I suppose he must have opened it after I was gone."

Selby glanced back at her opponent Williams. "So in your_ opinion_, Mister Coleman, according to what Patrick knew at that moment that box might have contained anything. For all he knew it might have been a box of cigars."

"Well, neither I nor Patrick smoked, at least I never saw him smoke."

"But the point is it could have been any number of a dozen other things in that box. You wanted to show him your gratitude so you offered him a gift, a gift that meant something to _you_. But let me ask you - did Mister Jane not in fact at first_ refuse_ the box?"

"That's correct, yes. He didn't want any gifts. He said it wasn't necessary."

"Patrick and perhaps you as well, must have known that members of law enforcement are prohibited from accepting gifts from clients or victims because such gratuities might be interpreted as a conflict of interest or perhaps even bribery."

"That's right but I still wanted – "

"We understand the circumstances, Mister Coleman, certainly. You wanted to show your thanks, but Patrick politely refused, didn't he?"

"Yes."

"In other words speaking in general terms, he had just done his job for the CBI and, as it turned out, for _you_ as he would have done for anyone else any other day of the work week."

"Yes, yes." Coleman said, anxious to cover over any harm his previous words might have caused his unspoken ally for the game of revenge. "That's the impression I got from him."

To cover ground Williams might decide to take up, Selby opened a counter-point "But then he accepted the box?"

"Well, I sort of...put it in his hands."

"In your opinion he didn't want to be rude perhaps?"

"No, Mister Jane was a well mannered person so when I insisted, he finally took it."

"And once more – Mister Jane never even opened it in your presence, did he?"

"No, he didn't. When I gave it to him, he had no idea the box contained a gun."

"One last question – was the gun loaded when you gave it to Mister Jane?"

"Uh, no. There were no bullets in the gun and the clip was empty."

"Let me understand." Selby emphasised once more. "Along with the gun you gave Mister Jane _no bullets at all_? So to _load _the gun, he would have had to _purchase bullets_?"

"Yes, or get them somewhere."

With her next statement Selby half addressed the jury as she did Coleman. "Speaking in general terms it stands to reason that in order to load a gun with bullets, one must touch the bullets. Do you agree Mister Coleman?"

"That stands to reason, yes."

Now Selby addressed the jury directly. "And yet no fingerprints belonging to Mister Jane were discovered on the bullets. Not even one single smudge."

Selby nodded to her witness. "Thank-you Mister Coleman. We appreciate your time."

Judge Gilpin addressed the Prosecution. "Do you wish to counter, Mister Williams?" He asked.

Williams was busy furiously writing in his note-pad and shook his head, only half rising in his seat. "No thank-you, your Honour."

The judge banged his gavel with all the authority of the law. "Court will resume Monday at eight AM."

CBI

Part 3 soon.


	3. Chapter 3

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 3**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. humour, and of course Jane-pain. **SMUT in this one!  
><strong>**Characters: **Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>The trial and the tribulations...  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

Cho was waiting outside in his car when court got out and Jane, a free man in between court dates, walked out alone. Van Pelt and Rigsby had offered supportive waves to him as they all fought through the crowd of reporters and the curious, becoming separated in the crowd and, in the end, each being forced to go their own way.

Jane fell into the passenger seat as though a man with the air let out of him, sagging against the back support and doing up his seat belt with the deliberate motions of an automaton.

Cho tried to lighten the atmosphere. "Bad week?"

Jane granted him a tiny grin but there was no enjoyment in it.

"Dinner?" Cho asked. Lisbon had kept him busy all day running down Jane's activities for the last several weeks and setting aside any tidbit of information, no matter how small, that would prove that Jane did not know Joshua Neil, had never met with him and had certainly not shot him down in cold blood. The pile of possibilities was scanty.

Until recently, when he had taken up a romantic connection with Cho, Jane had been such a private man when away from work that none of them ever knew where he went or who he saw until he came back on Monday. And only then did he occasionally reveal what he had done. Plus so many of those stories of his weekend adventures rang false that half the time they did not believe him. Who in their right mind would go alone to a _cheese_ festival?

"Drinks." Jane said.

Cho nodded, not sure it was a good idea to get sauced over the weekend but if it helped Jane cope, who was he to argue? He could probably use a double slam or two to ease the tension.

Cho parked in front a small, dark, little-known pub on the highway north out of Sacramento and walked into the place with Jane in tow. It was where he used to go to meet with a few of his old army buddies until they all moved away or life circumstances caused them to mostly drift apart. After two years the pub's staff had turned over and now no one here knew him. Jane's face told Cho that he had never been here either. If one of the staff or the half dozen patrons happened to recognise Jane's face from the evening news, there was a good chance they would leave him alone.

Cho chose a small booth in a corner far from the front doors and when the waitress came around, he ordered a pint draft. Jane chose a double scotch on the rocks which surprised Cho. Jane rarely drank and when he did it was almost always expensive wine.

They sat and nursed their drinks for a while. Cho thought it best to just stay quiet and let Jane talk if he wanted to. He would not push him. Nothing ever good had come from trying to push Jane into doing something he didn't want to do. Only Lisbon had that much influence over Jane and it was those rare times that, when Cho allowed himself to think about it, her power over Jane stuck in his craw.

Despite their romantic connections and Cho having screwed Jane's brains out on more than one occasion, it was Lisbon who wielded the most sway over the object of their mutual romantic interest. With misgivings Cho had seen how Lisbon sometimes looked at Jane; her soft blush of colour whenever Jane stood too close to her and her tendency to always overlook his deceits and other imperfections. Cho was certain that Jane was well aware of her feelings for him and used them to his own favour, at times even counting on Lisbon's weakness for him in order to get away with one of his schemes with little or no repercussions. Lisbon protected him as she would a secret lover and Jane, still being the habitual manipulator that he was, used it to his advantage whenever he could.

But Lisbon and Jane were not lovers. Cho was convinced of that. Jane might be a hustler and a liar but when it came to the affairs of love he was bound and gagged by his own heart's innate integrity, and however he tried to hide or deny it, it was a heart he wore on his sleeve. When Jane loved he loved totally, blindly; almost unhealthily. After nine years the man was still mourning his dead wife. He still wore the ring around his finger, a ring he had not taken off even for Cho nor, as far as he knew, for anyone - not for a minute. It was why Cho was convinced that, although he knew he was in love with Jane, Jane was not in love with him. Jane liked him, probably even had feelings for him but it had not developed beyond that, and so the ring stayed where it was.

And then there was the Lisbon issue and her unusual attachment to Jane. They had all to one degree or another grown to care about Jane almost right from the outset and that was one puzzle the answer to which Cho had not figured out. During their first cases with Jane on the team, he had not made a clean - nor certainly – an honest first impression, but it quickly became evident that there was _something_ about him; some indefinable aura of specialness that seemed to leave behind an invisible string that some people latched onto and then never let go.

Maybe it was the needful look on his face; the ever present sadness in his eyes, or just his terrible _alone_ness in the world that invited instant forgiveness. Jane was a loner who took great pains to convince people that he wasn't or that he didn't really mind being alone all the time, all the while wearing the gold band of his ten years dead wife on his wedding finger.

Right from the start they had all started caring about him – inexplicably it seemed. But the part that most surprised Cho when he had figured all this out was that Lisbon thought no one knew how _she_ felt, how tangled up in Jane she had become. But her team were an astute bunch of people and early on they_ all_ knew she had developed feelings for Jane almost right away, and the kind that went well beyond the professional. The difference between Cho and her was that she was simply not yet ready or willing to admit to them.

Cho could only hope it would stay that way. He hoped it each day that went by in fact because he knew Jane had some unspoken feelings for her secreted away somewhere, ones he never mentioned until they shone through on his face whenever he and Lisbon spent time together on a case; when things were going well. And Jane's face lit up when Lisbon was around and no matter how hard the blonde tried to hide it, Cho could see it there as plain as the sunshine. He himself loved the man but he doubted he could compete with Lisbon's womanly wiles if the day came where she decided to put her mind and heart into winning Jane to her bed.

None of that mattered at the moment as Jane stared down into his fourth drink. Cho wanted to get some food into him, too, and maybe a few Tylenol to combat the headache that was sure to result from an empty belly suddenly filled with hard liquor. "You tired?"

Jane looked up at his partner, feeling bad for having thus far pretty much blocked him out for the evening. He nodded. "Sorry."

Cho dropped his credit card on the table and the waitress spotted him, coming over with her little machine to tidy up the bill. Jane had not offered to even leave the tip and Cho wondered if the two million in bail money had cleaned him out. Cho stood. "Come on, let's go home."

In the car, Cho reassured him "You know all you have to do is ask if you need anything – right?" Cho felt a little dirty, as though he were trying to bribe Jane into staying with him, Jane maybe falling in love with him, maybe even devoting himself to him forever. Subconsciously, maybe it was a bribe.

Cho's offer had the unintended effect of Jane reaching for his wallet and digging out a fifty, dropping it on the seat between them.

"Jane, I didn't mean..."

"I know." He said quickly. "Cho, I'm fine. I've got money hidden that no one knows about it. I'll be fine."

"I don't want the fifty."

Jane watched the night-time city speed by his window. Row after row of house lights passed in a blur, filled with mostly contented families all settling in for an evening of American Idol. "I know, but I don't want to be in debt to anybody for anything anymore."

The bald somewhat out-of-context statement rather frightened Cho. "You don't owe me anything."

"Maybe not."

When Jane offered no further explanation, Cho fell silent, unsure what to do with this dark side of Jane that he knew existed but which he had only encountered once or twice. Dark, quiet Jane was a writhing mass of uncertainty and dread for anyone nearby.

Cho drove home without saying another word.

If he had been fearful of Jane losing interest in their physical get-togethers, Cho was soon assuaged by Jane's hungry kisses the moment they reached the bedroom in Cho's modest apartment. Jane almost never took the lead in their shared affections but tonight he initiated the love-making by urgently and rapidly undoing the buttons on Cho's dress shirt, his fumbling fingers and insistent lips encouraging Cho's help.

Cho obliged and as soon as he was divested of his suit it wasn't long before Jane was divested of every stitch of clothing as well and they were in bed with the covers on pressing their bodies together is ardent passion. Jane took the lead and Cho was shocked and delighted to feel Jane's hands demanding full control over everything they did, grabbing Cho's hand so hard it hurt and placing it over his hardening cock so Cho could fist him.

When Cho began stroking him, Jane growled and did a surprisingly graceful one-eighty flip on the bed and with all the perfect execution and speed of a gymnast, took Cho's cock into his mouth sucking on him like he was starving. Cho did the same at his end and gratefully swallowed Jane's erection as deeply as he could without choking, sucking and licking his length until with satisfaction he felt Jane's thighs shaking with the need to come.

This was it – the deep, deep sea, the unexplored ocean of Jane's flesh, every smell, every delicious moan form his mouth. Jane's hidden desires, freshly born or buried in the black depths, were waiting there just beyond his reach and he would reach them in time. Cho would sink into Jane over and over until he had tasted every breath from his lips and fucked every part of his hidden soul.

This feeling now and forever is what he wanted - to bring Jane everything the man needed, all that he had been missing, to offer him the lustful human affections that had to have been missing for so many years; the sad lack of contact with another human that all people must have in order to feel well in heart, mind and soul but of which Jane for so long had not tasted - to feel loved yet not be ashamed for needing that love. Jane believed - wrongly – that he had caused his wife and child to die, and therefore he deserved nothing. But Jane's atonement for that miscalculation had to end. Cho wanted to be that ending and the one to show his lover his unspoken intent by any all physical and emotional means at his disposal.

For now, though, it was the physical and Cho took in Jane's length like it was the best nourishment, the perfect silky sustenance for all needs and desires, no matter how insignificant. Their shared sex, the unbelievable high of making love to Jane, kissing and fucking him, was salvation in body and spirit. Here in this bed and beneath these sheets Cho was a god and Jane - a wayward son finally come home.

When they had both come down from the orgasm and the after-glow of satiation settled in, Cho lay half between wakefulness and sleep.

For a moment Jane watched as his lover drifted away and then turned on his side, raising his upper body on one elbow. Jane began to speak softly, very softly and very gently. Tapping Cho twice on the shoulder with his free hand, he said in a voice full of serenity, drifting into Cho's thoughts like a boat being pushed across a lake by a summer breeze. "You will rest very well tonight, Cho. In fact it will be the best sleep of your life and when you awake it will feel like the best morning of your life. You'll awake and feel alive and rested and happy, and everything will be fine. It will all be very, very fine and good. You'll remember Jane your colleague and you'll remember that you are friends and colleagues. No other memory of him will emerge to disturb you. Your mind will be a clean slate and things will be as they used to be before you fell in love with Jane. And it will all be good and fine and right. Do you understand?"

Cho mumbled in his hypnotic state. "Mm..d'wanna' f'get you, Jane."

"I know, but tomorrow when you wake up, you _will_ forget Jane. You'll forget that you ever loved him, and you'll forget about that ring you planned on buying him when you stopped into Chang's jewellery store on your lunch break last week. But that will be okay – you will feel okay about that because you'll remember that Jane isn't a good risk. Jane causes hurt and..." Jane swallowed. This was a hard lie to tell. "He doesn't love you back."

Jane paused in his soft oration as his emotions flooded up and threatened to upend the whole attempt. "Jane doesn't remember how to love someone and you understand that, don't you, Cho?"

Cho, his face twisted in confusion, said "It...be...yeah...o-okay...I guess so..."

"Yes, you understand, don't you Cho? Its okay - you probably just forgot. I want you to go to sleep now and sleep well. In the morning you're going to feel wonderful and everything will be fine. Will you do that now? Will you go to sleep and rest well?"

"Sure...'nything for you..."

Jane frowned, not sure the hypnosis was going to take. Cho's feelings for him ran deeper than even he anticipated but this had to be for Cho's own protection. Sometime during the court case, the prosecution was for certain going to rip into Cho and his relationship with the accused and possibly ruin the man's career and reputation for good. Jane could not in all good conscience allow that.

And even more worrisome, sooner or later Red John was going to make Jane pay dearly for caring about Cho - or anyone – other than Red John himself. The hypnotic suggestions had better take or there would be a reckoning in blood. Maybe Cho's, maybe his, maybe everyone he ever cared about. That was Red John's style. It would be foolish to suppose that the killer had changed his mind on such matters. Real psychopathic insanity hung around. There was no temporary about it.

"Rest, Cho." Jane said and his lover was asleep.

Jane got out of the bed being careful not to jostle it too much, getting dressed in the green glow of the bedside alarm clock. He slipped into his boxers, shirt and suit pants, and then stopped for a moment to fish around in Cho's work pants pocket. Finding Cho's small ring of keys, Jane located the key to his apartment and slipped it off the key ring. Pocketing it, he stuffed the ring back into Cho's pants, then finished getting dressed.

As Jane buttoned up his vest and slipped his arms into the sleeves of his suit jacket it suddenly hit him what he was about to walk out on and it was a virtual physical blow to his midsection. He actually had to stop and breathe in and out for a moment to calm his hammering heart and the sudden cold fear of what he was about to lose, probably forever. Jane stood there silently, leaning against the wall breathing hard, his eyes pouring water.

Even if he put aside what Red John had done to his family, for no other reason the killer was still going to die by his hands for this. Even for this alone - for stealing away the few brief moments of happiness he had experienced in nearly ten years. The last few months had been happier than he had remembered in a long time, and Red John was forcing him to abandon it – the one good joyous thing in his life.

Jane stood by the bedroom door watching Cho sleep for minutes more as he struggled to get his emotions under control and while he was able to keep from choking up, changing his mind and climbing back into the bed, he could not prevent the tears that ran ever stronger from his eyes. They fell in silence, a thousand water droplets that paralleled the soft ticking from the clock on the wall and the relentless marks in time's passing to his eventual third run-in with Red John, and the bloody aftermath that was sure to mark that collision.

Jane finally chose a mental exercise to help get his breathing under control. It would not do to pass out. Pushing away from the wall on shaky legs, he wiped at his eyes with a thumb and finger and left the apartment, locking the door behind him and slipping the key into his pocket.

Calling a cab from the street corner, Jane rode home to his Sacramento apartment, tossing Cho's spare apartment key out the window on the way. Cho would probably not even remember getting it cut for him.

CBI

"The Prosecution calls Doctor Ladal Jalak to the stand."

Lisbon recognised the name of the Medical Examiner in the Joshua Neil case. Cho had volunteered to preside over the team today and since things were quiet in the field of murder for the time being, she had agreed, though surprised that he had not requested to be in court himself to support Jane. She had at first refused his generous offer but then Cho had explained himself. "He doesn't need me there. He's strong. He'll be fine."

As soon as she saw Jane enter the court room and sit by his attorney's side, Lisbon put it out of her mind.

The doctor was called to the stand and Williams welcomed him with a generous smile plus a request for his name and occupation to be read into the record.

"My name is Doctor Ladal Jalak and I have been the Medical Examiner for the Sacramento County Coroner's Office for the last four and a half years."

"You are aware, Doctor, of the proceedings in this court room on Friday last?"

"Yes. I know that there was some question as to the bullets having no fingerprints on them and," He said his voice tightening up a little from the implied insult to his profession, "that there was some question as to the forensic work done on the case in conjunction with what evidence was or was not found on those bullets from the hand gun – the Glock. Let me assure you now there was _no improperly performed_ work in this mater. None of the bullets had fingerprints on them, not even the smudges from human skin that are sometimes found – that means no oils were present that would have originated on the fingers of a person."

"And what did this suggest to you, Doctor, about the bullets?"

"This indicated to me that the individual who loaded the weapon had to have worn gloves of some sort – we were unable to determine what kind..."

"How many cases such as this have you worked on during your tenure at Sacramento Doctor?"

"I have done the forensic investigation into eleven murder cases in the last four and half years."

"Only eleven?"

"We often have to farm, if you will, work out to other counties if we are short staffed or if there are other more pressing cases."

"Still, it seems a small number of cases." William said, inviting further explanation.

"People do not realise the sheer volume of work involved in a case such as this. We sometimes log in literally thousands of bits of evidence; hairs and fibres by the hundreds, each of which must be examined individually. Then there are the scrapings from beneath nail beds and the various substances and other matter found on shoes, clothes, inside cars or in this case, a garbage bin filled with all matter of evidence, most of which we must first sort out and then tag. There is also the contents of a victim's home that has to be bagged and logged in, each piece then needing to be carefully examined. It can takes weeks or months to process even a single case of a single individual murder victim. All of these kinds of evidence must be examined and a determination made as to whether it is relevant or not. The amount of work is often staggering."

"I understand, Doctor. So from your experience with the eleven cases you have taken to their conclusions, how many were gunshot victims?"

"Five."

"And how many where-in a weapon was recovered at some point?"

"Four."

"And of those four, in how many cases were you able to directly examine the bullets, either the bullets in the bodies or those remaining in the weapon itself?"

"Three and before you ask, in only one of those cases was I able to recover a partial print. One partial print only, a fragment, one too incomplete - _less _than was necessary to tie the weapon to the alleged murderer."

"I see. So it seems that while finding prints on the weapon, on the handle or the barrel or both, it is_ not_ unusual to find no prints on the bullets themselves."

"No in my experience it is not."

"In your experience and giving us your professional opinion only, why do you think this would be, Doctor Jalak? Why does it seem so difficult to locate human finger prints on the bullets?"

"There are many factors. The size of the bullets, whether the person who loaded the gun wore gloves, even the ambient temperature of the room can play a factor."

"The temperature?"

"Yes. If one is loading a weapon in extreme cold, the oils on the skin tend to solidify and that makes transference to any surface problematic - less likely to occur."

"Interesting. Thank you Doctor Jalak." William's said and looked over at Selby. "Counsellor Selby, your witness."

Selby stood and asked the doctor "As a resident of Sacramento County, what would you say is the average yearly temperature around here?"

"I'm sorry?"

"The temperature. We're living in south central California, Doctor Jalak, how often does it freeze-over in Sacramento? Do your palm trees die during the dark, cold winters?"

Jalak frowned. "Of course not, I was merely making a point."

Selby raised her eyebrows. "So am I. I am certain if Mister Jane was the one who loaded that gun he did not step into a beef freezer to do it, or put on gloves to load the gun and then take them off to shoot the victim. Does any of that make sense to you, Doctor? Does it sound like the actions of a methodical ingenious killer?"

"Objection!" Williams stood and appealed to the judge. "Does the Defence think our distinguished doctor's practise is in _psychiatry_ instead of medical autopsy?"

"Sustained. Please keep your questions, Counsellor, within the purview of your witness." Judge Gilpin advised.

"Certainly, your Honour." Selby answered. "Let me ask you this Doctor Jalak - out of the vast, _vast _number of murder cases involving guns that you have handled – what was it – eleven in total? How many turned out to be perpetrated with a gun owned by only one person?"

"I-I'm not certain. I think four or five if memory serves."

"Four or five? Leaving six or seven where the weapon had multiple owners or at least multiple users?"

"Yes, I suppose so."

"It is so. It _is _so. Have you ever examined a case, even testifying in court, where a weapon was loaded, even handled extensively by one individual and fired by another?"

"Ye-e-s, I'm not sure which one but yes I think there was a case..."

"Let me refresh your memory." Selby took up a sheet of typed paper and walked toward the witness box. "In the case of Sacramento County against one Stephen Nicholls, a weapon, in this case a small revolver, that Stephen had used just the day before at a target practise was used the next day to shoot his wife to death. Stephen, a new husband for the second time and deeply in debt, had an insurance policy on his wife to the tune of three hundred thousand dollars - a nice chunk of cash if you can get it. But Stephen, seemingly broken up about his wife's death, was charged with her murder."

Selby clutched the paper in her hand and waved it in the doctor's direction. "Seemed straight forward enough to me. They had the gun with his fingerprints on it, and they had a suspect in the husband who had no alibi and three hundred thousand dollars worth of motive."

Selby carried the typed sheet to the Defence table and plopped it down in front of Jane with a slam of her hand, making him jump. She abandoned it there as though the sheet had just become refuse, and this time walked over to speak directly to the members of the jury. "Turns out though, out of jealousy Stephen's best friend had taken the gun and used it to shoot the victim. Why jealousy and how do we know this? You see, the best friend was in love with Stephen and resented him marrying for the second time. Kill the wife as punishment for spurning his advances, leaving the grieving husband to rot in jail for her murder. Neatly done one would think."

Selby turned to the jury to explain the rest. "And how was this case solved you may wonder? Well, through some clever subterfuge the investigators in the case were able to get a confession out of the distraught shooter. The husband's fingerprints - Stephen's _fingerprints_ were all over the gun, oh yes, absolutely, but it was _another man_ who used it to shoot the wife, killing her."

Selby spread her hands and appealed to their intelligence. "Laughably simple when you think about it, isn't it? But without that confession, it at first appeared like a water-tight case against the husband." Selby shook her head at the near injustice done to the faceless Stephen Nicholls. "The fingerprints of _one man_ on the gun, but the murder perpetrated by _another man _altogether. All I can say is thank god for the diligent investigator who managed to expose the lies and get a signed confession from the _real_ killer." Selby walked back to her table where Jane sat quietly, looking at his hands and then over at her.

Selby turned back once more to the jury before reseating herself. "Oh, by the way, the investigator who solved that case?" She pointed to her client. "Mister _Patrick Jane_. Thank-you Doctor. No further questions."

CBI

"The Defence calls Agent Teresa Lisbon to the stand." Selby announced.

Teresa Lisbon, dressed today in pressed slacks and suit jacket over plain white tee-shirt instead of her work jeans, took the stand, trying to relax. It was not the first time she'd been in a court room and not even the first time she'd been called to testify on behalf of a colleague accused of murder but it was the first time it was Patrick Jane for whom she was testifying. The evening before Selby had once more gone over some of the crucial questions she would be putting to her and how to answer. Lisbon was cooperative but not happy about being forced to expose the personal side of Jane, a friend, to strangers.

Selby did not waste time. "Agent Lisbon, please state your name and occupation for the record."

"My name is Teresa Lisbon and I'm an agent with the California Bureau of Investigation in charge of the homicide division."

"Thank-you. How many agents make up the homicide division?"

"Four, including me and one consultant."

"Mister Patrick Jane being that consultant?"

"Yes."

"I'm curious – why was Mister Jane not made an agent? I suppose a better question would be what is involved in becoming an agent with the CBI?"

"Several years experience with one police agency or another – preferably in homicide, an outstanding service and performance record during those years, and then often several applications before you are accepted, and most who apply I'd like to add are not ever accepted – or you might get the position by direct recruitment but that's rare."

"I see. So Mister Jane met none of these requirements?"

"Mister Jane is not a cop, although his performance is evaluated on a yearly basis like everyone's. But he is the only employee who works for us via a yearly contract."

"So he was, in a manner of speaking, recruited?"

"Yes. Jane came to us on a six month trial basis at half pay. It was an experiment the Bureau dabbled in a few years ago – to bring in a civilian with special skills as an aid or advisor. Having a civilian's face out there was going to be used as an encouragement to the public, so they could better relate to us. It was a PR thing."

"But he is not trained in police work?"

"No."

"What is involved in being an agent in CBI homicide, and I refer to the skills required to do the job?"

"University degree in Criminology, weapons, physical defence, law enforcement protocols, State and Federal Law, and usually one or two other law enforcement specialties such as tactical weapons training or interrogation techniques."

"So Mister Jane has no weapons training?"

"No."

"He has never used a gun?"

"Only once that I know of, a shot-gun. He...killed someone."

"Oh? And who did Mister Jane shoot?"

"A man named Hardy, who was about to kill me."

"So what you're saying to us is that Patrick Jane saved your life?"

"Yes he did. He saved all our lives actually that night."

"Who was this Hardy?"

"Sherriff Hardy, he was a man who was working for Red John the serial killer. It was a case Jane and I worked on together a few years back, during Jane's first year with the CBI."

"And Jane _shot_ this man? A man who might have led the team to capturing and bringing to justice a serial killer, to capturing Red John, the infamous multiple murderer?"

"Yes, but Jane had no choice. He had to do it, he _had_ to shoot."

"How would you describe Jane's handling of the weapon, in this case the shot gun?"

"Amateur. Sloppy. Jane hates guns, and blood and violence. If it were his choice I'm sure he would have warring countries settled their differences over a good game of poker."

"And yet he works in homicide?"

"Jane is a private person, so he may tell you otherwise but I think he does it to help people. So people will not have to go through what he went through, but no, he'll never be a cop. Don't get me wrong, Jane's a smart man but when it came to handling the weapon, he did not know what he was doing."

Lisbon couldn't help it. She chuckled just a little. "Sorry." She cleared her throat. "It's not funny, it's just...he just pointed from the hip and pulled the trigger. It's sort of a miracle he even _hit _Hardy. But he saved my life, and for that I will always be grateful." Lisbon looked over at Jane who met her eyes briefly, then looked away, down at his folded hands. He spent most of his time looking nowhere but at them.

Lisbon hoped her testimony was helping. By saving her life Jane had lost the opportunity to track Red John through Hardy. Jane didn't know it but she regretted losing than opportunity more than he did. Lisbon knew she would never forget the look on Jane's face when Hardy revealed nothing, and then died while laughing at him.

"These last four years Jane has proved himself." Lisbon offered impulsively. "His skills are unique, which is why he's still with us. He may not be a cop but he's a valuable asset to my team. We don't want to lose him."

CBI

Part 4 soon.


	4. Chapter 4

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 4**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. Mentions of humour, and of course Jane-pain.** NO** **SMUT in this one!  
><strong>**Characters: **Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>The trial and the tribulations...  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

Sorry this is more than a week overdue. Got sick on my birthday weekend and slept most of the time. So now I am off for the day but YOU stay home and read! :D

CBI

Selby nodded thoughtfully. "I can understand that, Agent Lisbon. Mister Jane has come to be a member of the team and a team can be like a family. But about this Red John character – Mister Jane has been tracking him for years – with the CBI's help. Is that correct?" While she waited for Lisbon to answer, Selby gathered a pad of notes from her desk.

"Until recently, yes. The case is currently being overseen by the FBI under Agent Darcy."

"For those on the jury who are unfamiliar with the Red John cases, or with Red John himself, would you please describe for us in some detail the nature of Mister Jane's connection to the Red John cases and to Red John as well?"

Lisbon stole a glance at Jane, cleared her throat and swallowed. "Yes, um,...Red John murdered Mister Jane's family, his wife and daughter, and Jane has been hunting Red John ever since, with the CBI's help when appropriate."

"The CBI's help? The case was assigned to your office?"

"Yes, for several years."

"But now it is not so?"

"No, a year ago the cases were reassigned to the FBI under Agent Darcy."

"When the CBI did have the Red John files, in your opinion as his supervisor how did working on those cases affect Mister Jane? How did he handle the pressures - or the _disappointments_ - since your team failed to capture Red John?"

"Well, for the most part."

"Well? How so since Mister Jane murdered Red John –or thought he did - in a mall in front of dozens of people and against I can only assume was your explicit orders not to confront Red John himself but to allow law enforcement to take him into custody?"

"Jane did not expect to encounter Red John – we had hoped he would show but as far as we understood, as far as Jane understood, Red John was a no-show, until it was discovered that Timothy Carter's phone was the last number dialled from Agent McLaughlin's cell phone. I made that call myself."

"Agent McLaughlin was the agent who shot you?"

"Yes. We had just discovered him to be an accomplice of Red John."

Williams stood. "Your Honour, is this trial about Joshua Neil or Timothy Carter? The Timothy Carter case has been closed for over a year, or is Ms. Selby aware of something we aren't?"

Selby spoke to Judge Gilpin. "In order to understand a clear picture of Mister Jane's normal state of mine, Your Honour, I must allow the jury at least some access to his work and life history. This will speak to his unstable motivations in shooting Joshua Neil."

"Granted but I caution you that you are on the State's clock. Don't let this get bigger than it needs to be." Gilpin advised.

"Certainly Your Honour."

Selby addressed Lisbon. "As to your last statement - Agent McLaughlin was discovered to be a Red John accomplice, but almost too late. Is that correct?"

"Yes."

"At the time were you also aware that Jane was about to confront Red John on his own without any protection?"

"I wasn't sure. I was wounded and Jane hung up his phone. After that, no matter how many times I called, he didn't answer."

"What did that indicate to you?"

"That perhaps he was in trouble."

"Did it not also cross your mind that perhaps Mister Jane did not want the CBI's help in finally confronting the man he at the time believed to be Red John, or that he wished to confront Red John on his own?"

"Well, yes."

"Did Patrick Jane not say as much to you on several occasions? – that he wanted his revenge and would not tolerate Red John simply being taken into custody, but that he wanted Red John dead?"

"Yes, not in those words but –"

"- but it was in those words, Agent Lisbon, wasn't it?" Selby turned to the notes in her hands. "Things are often overheard in offices where people work in close knit groups. Did Mister Jane not say these words to you on at least one occasion and I am paraphrasing – "I will cut him open and watch him bleed until he is dead. I will have my revenge." Is that not correct?"

It was clear Selby had lead the conversation to this with the intent on showing the jury, and everyone else, that over the years Jane's state of mind had been deteriorating. Jane's entire mental state was about to be blown wide open. "He said..._something_ like that, yes."

"Did Mister Jane not in fact have these long-range plans to confront the serial killer who murdered his family, and to do such on his own? A pretty dangerous decision for a man who carried no weapon, was not properly trained in their use, nor possessing any knowledge of self defence. Did Mister Jane really expect to survive this encounter with a seasoned murderer wherever or however that encounter might take place?"

"Well, Jane did survive the encounter at the theatre – "

Selby turned away from Lisbon to speak to the jury. "To clarify for the members of the jury, three film students had Mister Jane bound, and were ready to murder him to complete their own sick film project. Red John appeared on the scene and shot to death two of them and wounded a third. But he did not shoot Mister Jane. Why Red John chose at that time not to kill him we can only speculate."

Selby asked Lisbon. "I'm asking you about the wisdom of his decision, Agent Lisbon. Had this always been Mister Jane's intent from the beginning; since joining the CBI: Did he wish to kill Red John himself? Was that his wish?"

"Yes. But I believe his years with the Bureau would have prevent-"

"- but his years with the CBI did _not _prevent it, did it, Agent Lisbon? Mister Jane gunned down Timothy Carter seemingly without a second thought."

Lisbon was beginning to wonder if Selby was on Jane's side or the prosecution's. "He shot him, yes."

"Because he believed Timothy Carter was Red John."

"Yes."

Williams smiled to himself, idly delighted that Selby appeared to making his own case for him. He could do no worse than let her keep questioning Agent Lisbon.

"During his years working under your supervision, have you ever, Agent Lisbon, observed behaviour from Patrick that might suggest to you that he was not in his right mind?" Selby raised a finger to Williams to let him know she understood the question encased the potential for her colleague to request overrule from Judge Gilpin. "Stating your _observations _only please, I am not asking that you draw conclusions as to his state of mind – simply whatever things and situations that you have _observed_ as his supervisor and friend - the facts if you will."

Lisbon wondered what specific time she should talk about. To her, most of Jane's antics were related, not to his state of mind, but to his _methods_ for gathering information and rendering an experienced opinion on who the guilty party might be – and his antics following _that_ again being in fact his _methods_ (however odd they may appear to outsiders), to help bring the guilty parties to justice. None of it to her smacked of insanity. "Jane is an unusual man. His background, the way he thinks, his uncanny ability to read people – and I don't mean minds – but body language, facial expression, tics, whatever you want to call them – Jane has never – "

"Agent Lisbon I understand your desire to protect the reputation of your friend, but Jane's on-the-job hands-on methods if you will is not what I asked you. Perhaps I phrased the question poorly. Have you ever directly observed anything that would suggest to you or anyone that Patrick Jane was not in his right mind?"

Lisbon desperately tried to find something that would lend support to Selby's plea of temporary insanity, racking her brain to come up with a situation or time that would clearly show Jane's thinking had been serious skewed or his actions those of an man not in complete control of his faculties – something recent – but she couldn't. "No–I...um, no Ms. Selby, I would have to say no." Lisbon wished she could take the woman aside ask her what the hell she was doing. Williams himself looked like the cat that swallowed the canary.

"Thank you Agent Lisbon." Selby said and looked to her colleague. "Your witness, Mister Williams."

Williams straightened his too-tight suit jacket on his thick frame and leaned against the witness stand podium very friendly-like.

"Agent Lisbon, in this court room Mister Jane has been described as an unusual man. His history, how he was raised was also unusual. A man who's methods of operation on the job may be..." He spread his hands friendly-like as well "...a bit unorthodox but never-the-less brilliant, and his record thus far other than a few minor infractions is excellent. He is in fact, according to his most recent performance evaluation, a major reason your departments solve-rate has risen by thirty-nine percent during the last three years. To his colleagues, co-workers and to your boss Mister Bertram, Patrick Jane is to all appearances a first class investigator. Would you agree with that assessment, Agent Lisbon?"

"Yes."

"When Mister Jane maps out - if you'll forgive the colloquialism - a bust for the team, have you observed any behaviour on Jane's part that would suggest otherwise? That would suggest he was acting haphazardly – without forethought or direction? Was there any_ planned_ bust, any mapped-out, _planned_ operation that in your mind stands out to you as a move that might be described as highly dangerous to himself or to others?"

"No, but not every bust goes according to plan. Things can go wrong."

"Things such as the behaviour of the suspect or the timing or any of dozens of unseen parts in any investigation that cannot be readily predicted?"

"Of course. No matter how good you are at your job, or at reading people or predicting what a person will do, there are always unknown factors."

"Naturally. The world does not bow to our will, no matter how much we would like it to. So let me understand you, Agent Lisbon. During your four years working with him every day, side-by-side, has Mister Jane ever performed his job in a manner that you would describe as not normal – as an observer, and as his supervisor, have you ever seen him acting in a way that might be interpreted as insane?"

"There were times where I questioned his methods and the danger those methods sometimes brought to him..."

"And to the team, wouldn't you say?"

"Yes, but we are trained for such situations."

"Of course. Was Mister Jane at all disciplined for these situations?"

"Yes." Lisbon was watching Jane watch his hands. During the last three days of testimony he had hardly looked up from the table. She did not think it was a sign that he was feeling defeated, but that he was feeling exposed, once again before the world, his very person and self questioned and doubted as to its validity and worth. "Just as any agent would be disciplined, but if you're asking my opinion? I have never seen Jane deliberately act recklessly and he would not hurt anyone without cause."

"Thank you Agent. No more questions."

Lisbon was angry – "So the idea that Jane shot the man Joshua at all is ridiculous."

"Thank you, that will be _all_, Agent Lisbon."

"So however you want to interpret that – be my guest." She finished.

Williams smirked to himself. God bless the soothe-sayers.

CBI

"The prosecution recalls Doctor Jalak."

The medical examiner took his seat and Williams leaned on the witness podium to speak to him. "Doctor, we have discussed the bullets recovered from the body, we have discussed the bullets found in the gun, we have discussed the fingerprints on the gun – those belonging to Patrick Jane - would you tell us now about the blood evidence. What blood evidence might there be to link Mister Patrick Jane to Joshua Neil? _Is_ there any?"

The doctor read from his own report. "Yes, there is. The Medical Examiner's Office recovered a smear of blood from the underside of the belt buckle belonging to the dead man, to Joshua Neil, and we ran a DNA analysis on it, comparing that result with a sample of Patrick Jane's blood."

"And what was your office's expert judgement on that test?"

"Not only is the blood type the same but the two samples of DNA are identical. It was definitely Mister Jane's blood on the belt buckle."

"The belt-buckle of the belt worn by the dead man? The belt discovered on Joshua Neil's body?"

"Yes."

Williams turned to address the jury. "DNA evidence ladies and gentlemen - irrefutable evidence tying Patrick Jane to the dead man – to Joshua Neil. Jane, a man thus far described as, not a man out of his mind, but a man in control of his life and career, who had by his excellent work within the CBI increased the effectiveness of his agency's close-rate. More cases solved because of him. Does this sound like the career of a mad man or a man who has temporarily lost his mind? No! Patrick Jane is, rather, a methodical, cunning man who makes no bones about his lust for revenge. I put it to you that Patrick Jane knew Joshua Neil and all the evidence thus far points to the clear fact that Patrick Jane also shot Joshua Neil down, killing him.

"Now my esteemed colleague is about to get up here and sling her arrows about the question of why. Why would Jane kill this man, a complete stranger or so it has been claimed? Well, I'll tell you why: because Patrick Jane had decided that Joshua Neil was either Red John or an accomplice of Red John. This Red John is quite the individual isn't he? He appears to have accomplices everywhere; law enforcement, secretaries, FBI, the man is practically a Napoleon. I say again - the whys in Patrick Jane's mind are simple. Jane had already shot a man he believed to be Red John, so it should be no stretch to believe he might make that same mistake twice. Patrick Jane see's Red John accomplices everywhere. Ask yourselves - does that make him insane? A bit paranoid perhaps..."

Williams took a deep breath as though the answer were so obvious a child would see it. "Patrick Jane is no crazy man, ladies and gentlemen. He was not insane, or_ temporarily_ insane, when he shot Joshua Neil, he was acting on his plan - his great plan for revenge. Patrick Jane in his daily working life may be a little unorthodox perhaps but he has also been described as a methodical, precise thinker, and a talented investigator – it's been spoken of right here – you yourselves have heard it.

"Patrick Jane murdered once when he shot down Timothy Carter in a shopping mall in front of hundreds of witnesses. And now again he has shot someone, only this time in secret - even hiding the body. Making mistakes for certain in leaving the gun behind, and not wearing gloves... but perhaps it was because this time he panicked. He realised _this time_ he might not get away with murder. Because whatever else Patrick Jane is ladies and gentlemen, what he is most of all is a_ murderer_."

Lisbon wished she could apologise to Jane for all of it but instead she stayed in her seat, feeling sick to her stomach. Rigsby leaned over and spoke a reassuring platitude into her ear that she barely heard. She hoped that Selby had something more up her sleeve than making the prosecution's case for them.

Judge Gilpin asked Selby "Counsellor, do you wish to cross?"

Selby remained in her seat. "No questions, your Honour. But I request a five minute recess to make a phone call?"

Judge Gilpin nodded, banging his gavel down once. "Granted and we'll make it ten."

He was no doubt as anxious for a coffee or pee-break as anyone else, Lisbon thought. She stood to stretch her legs and then followed Selby out into the hall, confronting her by the women's bathroom. "Are you trying to help him or put him away?"

Selby frowned at the interruption. "Agent Lisbon, I'm on the phone."

"And Jane's about to go down as a nut-job."

"Yee have little faith." Selby turned away and spoke to the person on the other end for a moment, then closed the call. She looked at Lisbon. "My next witness is going to turn this show on his head, Agent Lisbon, and I need to prepare."

"Who? What witness?"

"Sophie Miller."

"Jane's old psychiatrist? But she's up on charges."

"Not anymore - that's what that call was about. I needed to ensure she is ready with her testimony – hence the call. Those charges by the way were instigated by some out-patient ex-cons she was treating at the same time Jane was under her care. They were crooks out for state cash and as it turns out their accusations didn't hold any water. Therefore Sophie Miller is free to testify on his behalf."

"And convince the jury that he's nuts."

"Only _temporarily_ nuts Agent - be happy, this is good news. Miller's testimony may save me from having to put Patrick on the stand."

CBI

Lisbon waved to Rigsby as she dialled the office.

"CBI - Cho."

"Hey. How's it going?"

"We've got a double homicide in the core to check out. PD thinks they can handle it but want us in on the consult. I think they're mistaking the team for Jane."

Lisbon wanted to laugh but there just wasn't any part of this that was funny. "All we can do is our best work."

"How's the trial going?" He asked.

"Pretty much as I expected. Jane's mental state is about to be skewered by his psychiatrist." _Former_ psychiatrist she silently reminded herself.

"We all know Jane's not crazy, but it may be the only way to save him from becoming an old man in an eight-by-four cell."

"I know." Lisbon hated to think of Jane, a man who had spent his entire childhood travelling around and his whole adulthood thus far roaming wherever his heart took him, sitting in a cell with only his mind to keep him company. It was a cliché but Jane had always struck her as one of the freest spirits imaginable. He loved the outdoors and going to new places and doing new things on a whim, disappearing into the great big world without nary a word or a glance behind him.

And the simplest things in life entertained him. Lisbon had once seen Jane dressed in his full suit, just for a quick bit of fun, climb onto a roundabout and spin like a goof until he was dizzy. Another time, during a lull in a horrific child murder case, he'd shed his jacket and vest to join a nearby softball pitch short a few players. Before long the whole team had joined in and for two hours one depressing afternoon they were suddenly having the time of their lives.

At times it seemed as though life itself cried out to Jane - springing him from his self-imposed loneliness, if only for a few hours, and Jane answered that call whenever he could. The fresh and unpredictable Jane; in some ways he was still very much like a kid, running, laughing and bounding like a deer in a meadow. You don't lock that kind of breathy soul in a prison. You don't cage a gazelle. "Cho, I was wondering, are you and Jane okay?"

Cho was silent for just a second. "What do you mean?"

Lisbon did not know what to say. Was Cho trying to tell her to mind her own business? "I mean, you and Jane seem...different lately. I suppose it's none of my business but has something happened between you two?"

Another second's pause, and then with a hint of confusion "No. We're...good."

It sounded sincere. Normal. Neutral. It sounded Cho. "Okay, just asking. Are you coming to the trial tomorrow?"

"Once the interviews are done."

"Okay. Well, I'll let you know how it goes."

"Okay."

Still perfectly Cho. Lisbon hung up.

CBI

THE NEXT DAY

"The Defence calls Doctor Sophie Miller to the stand." Selby smiled slightly at her witness. "Please state your name and occupation for the record."

"I am Doctor Sophie Lee Miller. I am a practicing psychiatrist with the Behavioral Health Department at the Manhattan Psychiatric Centre in New York ."

"And in particular what sort of mental health problems do people come to you for Doctor Miller?"

"There are several kinds of problems I help people deal with: depression, anxiety, eating disorders, bi-polar-ism, substance abuse, crises, psychoses..."

"Thank you, Doctor. Tell us – at one time Mister Jane was under your care, isn't that right?"

"Yes. I was assigned to his case –"

"I'm sorry, Doctor, one moment. You were assigned?"

"Yes. Mister Jane became a patient at Greenlawn Psychiatric Facility in 2003. In his third week as a patient, I was assigned his case."

"Why was that? I mean why only _three_ weeks after Patrick Jane was admitted did you became his psychiatrist?"

"Despite the best efforts of the facility, Mister Jane had not responded to the standard treatments. As I was on staff as a consulting psychiatrist, they requested I take his case."

"I see. And at that time, can you tell us in some detail your initial assessment of his mental state? What was wrong with Mister Jane?"

Miller looked over at her famous patient sitting quietly staring at his hands, recognizing the physical gesture, an outward sign that in him indicated depression. "Patrick Jane had experienced an extreme tragedy in his life-"

"-the murder of his wife of ten years and of their eight year old daughter." Selby said.

"Yes." Miller nodded. "And because of that Patrick was suffering from a debilitating post traumatic stress disorder termed Numbing-Avoidance. It is a mental/emotional reaction that causes the patient to withdraw mentally from his surroundings and to cease to feel emotion itself. It is basically a sudden onset of severe depression that is characterized by behaviors such as mental or emotional detachment – or both – also depression, guilt, ongoing grief reactions such as crying jags, fear, anxiety, insomnia, even amnesia, and sometimes all of it with little to no outward sign."

"That's quite a list. And do you recall which of these Patrick was suffering?"

"Well, all of them."

"_All _of them?"

"Yes. In my observations of him I came to understand that Patrick was a patient who tended to feel things very deeply and so this trauma caused an extreme reaction in him. Regular psychiatric treatments were proving ineffective."

"At what point in his first three weeks of treatment did they call you in? I mean they must have been treating him somehow?"

"The staff physicians had attempted talk therapy along with anti-anxiety medications to no avail."

"I'm sure most of us here have heard of talk therapy at one point or another – but it was not working on Patrick at all?"

"No." Miller looked out over the audience. "When I first met Patrick as my patient, he had not spoken a word for three weeks. When he tried to kill himself, that's when they called me in."

Selby made sure her expression was soulful and empathetic for her client, and stood so the jury could see her face, though she was in fact looking at her witness. "He tried to commit suicide?"

"Yes. It was what we in the medical profession call a cry for help, though it was in itself unusual."

"How so?"

"Patrick had cut up his forearms and spread the blood on the wall. He made a smiling-face on the wall using his own blood."

Selby looked suitably horrified. "He painted a smiling face using his _own_ blood?"

"Yes. I later learned that the killer who murdered Patrick's family always left behind a smiling face – I think law enforcement types call it a "signature". Patrick found his family like that. Cut open and posed in the daughter's bedroom, with the smiling face on the wall."

Lisbon sucked in a quiet breath. Jane had described his time in the hospital as "a bad patch". Selby was shaking her head sadly and speaking to Miller as though they were the only two people of importance in the courtroom. At that moment not even Jane was there to listen to them discussing before the world what Jane had called his shame.

Lisbon watched Jane's slumped frame, wishing she could put her arm around his shoulder and assure him that it didn't matter in the least what they said – he was still the same good, caring man in her book. But she knew Jane would reject such sentiment, as he would also probably shrug off the physical comfort.

"I can only imagine what that would have done to him." Selby remarked.

Miller said "I don't have to imagine, I _know_ what it did to him."

"How long was Patrick in your care?"

"Eighteen weeks. He began to respond to talk therapy once I put him on the appropriate medications and alternate therapy."

"Anti-anxiety drugs?"

"Yes, supplemented with two others that had proved effective in similar cases. Patrick began responding and he finally left the hospital with a clean bill of health."

"Forgive me for bringing it up, Doctor Miller, but if I do not, my colleague will so I must. What were these other therapies you spoke of that you used with Patrick Jane? Were there any that were, how shall I say, controversial?"

Sophie Miller flushed red. "Yes. As I said before at the time I believed Patrick would not respond with traditional drugs or the common therapies so I instituted a treatment called Accentuated Experiential Physical Psychotherapy."*

"And what is" Selby mimicked the new and unusual terms "_Accentuated Experiential Physical Psychotherapy_?"

"It is a technique that incorporates the elements of what we term Secure Attachment. It is a talk and physical therapy focusing on the mutual exchange of all deeply-seated emotions using methods that encourage mind/emotion/body awareness and incorporating pleasant physical exchange in each session."

"And how does one "incorporate pleasant physical exchange" during a session?"

"Not the way one might think." Miller underlined. "There is no sexual element to it _what-so-ever_. And each patient must agree to it _in writing_ prior to the first session. It involves the touching of hands, parts of the face –"

"-You mean the hands and face of the patient and the hands and face of the therapist?"

"Exactly. It is not a clinical description but Patrick had mentally and emotionally removed himself from life. In order to gain his trust and his willingness to return to the whole, flawed human race, I had to reach him with something more than words. And as I said before, Patrick was an emotionally demonstrative man prior to his trauma – which good quality needed to be reached and drawn upon, to, if you will, bring him back to life again."

"And all that accomplished through touching?"

"Yes."

"Can you demonstrate to us this touching therapy for the benefit of the jury? Give us an example?"

Miller, prepared for it, said "Yes. Agent Rigsby has agreed to help me."

Lisbon turned to stare at her employee as he stood up to make his way to the front of the courtroom.

He whispered. "Sorry, boss, I wasn't allowed to discuss it with anybody."

Rigsby took his place in the middle of the room and Doctor Miller left the witness box to stand opposite him. Only ten inches or so of space was left between their bodies. Miller took both of his hands in hers and said "Please listen to my instructions Agent Rigsby, this will be very simple."

He nodded. "Sure."

"Lean forward a few inches." Miller told him**.**

When Rigsby did so, Miller did the same until their foreheads touched. "Now while in this position." Miller explained to the entire courtroom, "The patient – in this case Patrick - and I would just talk. Whatever was on his mind, whatever he might be feeling, no matter what it was, we would discuss it while we touched hands and heads."

Selby and the audience watched the exchange. At first observation, it was clearly not sexual, but after a second look, it was obviously intimate. It had to be. Who goes around bumping foreheads with their doctor?

Miller leaned away and Rigsby did the same, putting distance between their bodies. Miller nodded her thanks to Rigsby and returned to the witness box, but her eyes never left Jane. Rigsby returned to his seat beside Lisbon.

Miller was explaining to the jury and the audience. "It is a therapy designed to encourage mentally or emotionally detached patients to connect physically with another human being, and to learn to trust that connection. The touching brings a kind of physical comfort to the patient as well which studies have shown is crucial to emotional healing. Babies for example who are raised without physical affection become withdrawn, anxious, ill - even psychotic. The physical touch therapy also helps to bring out the grief, the fear and the anger -_ all_ the unhealthily repressed emotions people who experience a terrible trauma, people like Patrick, tend to want to hide away from.

"After extreme trauma such as war, a car accident..." Miller looked at Patrick, "or the loss of your entire family, having to feel those overpowering emotions can be like a second trauma on top of the first one. People who go through such stresses can feel like they themselves have been in some way destroyed. The therapy helps patients to understand that the_ emotions_ associated with the trauma will not destroy what's left of their soul, so-to-speak. It teaches them to adapt to what's happened and move on."

Miller underlined it to Selby. "In order to help Patrick heal I first needed to get him to _feel _again. Nothing else was working."

"And did this therapy work?" Selby asked.

"With Patrick, yes."

"But it does not work with all patients?"

"No. That's why it is still in the experimental stage. Greenlawn approved it and Patrick, once he was talking, agreed to try it."

"It _did _work?" Selby asked again.

"Yes. After four and half months Patrick was discharged. Next I heard he was working with the CBI and doing very well."

"And what would be your assessment of Patrick Jane now?"

"I would say that he has completely recovered. He's working in a high stress occupation and has achieved everything one might expect from a brilliant, success-driven person. I'm proud of him."

Selby nodded her approval. "Thank-you, Doctor Miller." Turning to Williams - "Counsellor? Your witness..."

CBI

Part 5 soon.

* Accentuated Experiential Physical Psychotherapy is NOT a real therapy. I got an idea from the Web, and made the rest up.


	5. Chapter 5

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 5**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. Mentions of humour, and of course Jane-pain.

**Characters: **Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>The trial and the tribulations...  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

_*Please note that although I have done some research into court-room proceedings and lawyer-speak, **I am no expert** **at either**. I have only been in a court-room twice in my life (once to render testimony on behalf of a friend and once on behalf of myself – neither one a murder trial!) I have listened to how lawyers talk in court and I suspect it varies widely. In my experience, one seemed competent while the other came across an idiot. _

CBI

Williams approached the witness stand and, linking his fingers together, asked "You have testified today that in your professional opinion, Mister Jane has completely recovered?"

Miller drew her head up, mentally readying herself for anything Williams might throw her way "Yes."

"Well, that is good news, isn't it? But tell us, Doctor Miller; did Mister Jane at any time while under your care, act in a violent way?"

"Well, when patients have undergone trauma such as he-"

"Excuse me, Doctor Miller, but we understand Mister Jane had gone through stress – and that he had already hurt _himself_, that has already been made clear. What we would like to know is if Mister Jane at any point while under your professional care as his psychiatrist acted out? With violence? Toward anyone? Toward _you_ perhaps?"

Miller cleared her throat. "There was...one incident."

"Incident?" Williams repeated. "Hardly a sufficient word to describe what it reads in your own report, is it?" Williams retrieved his notes from the prosecution's table and flipped to the page he wanted. "Shall I read it to you directly from your own report on file or are you willing to be forthright with us and tell us exactly what happened?"

Miller took a deep breath. "One week before he was discharged, Mister Jane...became violent in the common room."

"I see." Williams raised his eyebrows as though to say to the jury _isn't __**this **__a surprise?_ "Violent in what way?"

"Patrick attacked one of the orderlies – he threw a chair at him and tried to escape. It was a delayed reaction to one of the medications he was on, Patrick would never-"

"But he did, Doctor Miller, he did. You say he threw a chair. Sounds innocuous enough but was the orderly injured?"

"He received a concussion."

"And this orderly was up on his feet the following day?"

Miller stared coldly at Williams. "No. He was hospitalized."

"For how long?"

"Nine days."

"And I'm assuming he was awake for those nine days? He was conscious?"

"No. For five of those days the man was in a coma. He awoke and several days later he was discharged."

"I see. So throwing a chair at someone and causing them to be hospitalized is a normal state of affairs for a patient under your care?"

"Of course not, he-"

"Patrick Jane was under your care, Doctor, and you have just stated to this court that only one week prior to his discharge – a patient that according to you was nearly fully recovered - _hospitalized_ a man who did nothing to him what-so-ever. Or had this orderly hurt Mister Jane in any way?"

"No. It was the _medication_ that made Patrick do that."

"Were there any incidents prior to this very serious one?"

"There was one other, very minor incident."

"And what were the circumstances of that violence?"

"It could hardly be called violence. Patrick pushed another patient."

"Oh? Why?"

"That patient kept bothering Patrick, wanting to see magic tricks and other...entertainment I suppose. Patrick kept refusing, finally pushing the fellow to make his point."

"So Patrick pushed the other patient down? Tripped him? What?"

"Patrick pushed him against a wall."

"And were there words exchanged?" Williams asked quietly.

Miller knew Williams had the details in his hands. "Patrick threatened him."

Williams spun around to face her and demanded "_Stop _beating around the bush, Doctor Miller – and tell us the whole truth! What did Patrick say to this other patient whom he pushed up against a wall?"

Miller swallowed hard. "Patrick said that if the man did not stop bothering him then he would...kill him."

"Kill him?" Williams repeated loudly for the jury. "_Kill_ him? Patrick said he would _kill him_?"

"Yes, but he didn't mean it. We had taken him off the drug and he was going to be fine."

"Oh, he was _going to be_ fine? Which drug by the way, and when was he taken off it – before or after the incident with the chair?"

"We had decided to put Patrick on methylphenidate2."

"The brand-name, if you please, Doctor."

"Next Generation Rytalin."*

"This drug is used for what?"

"For anxiety. In my opinion the standard bupropion and amitriptyline – commonly known as Wellbutrin and Elavil- were not having enough of an effect on his depression and agitation problems, so we decided to put him on Rytalin2 as a short term supplement."

"Including the Rytalin2, how long was Patrick on this drug regime? How many weeks before the incident?"

"The first week he was put on bupropion and amitriptyline . Five weeks into his treatment he was put on the Rytalin2 for a duration of ten weeks, then we stopped it."

"Because...?" Williams spread his hands.

"We were worried about the possible increasing adverse effects. Patrick was already showing _some_ counter-effects so it was thought best to discontinue the drug."

"Counter-effects meaning side-effects? Negative side effects?"

"Yes."

"Are those were?"

"Hyper anxiety, insomnia, night terrors, headaches, heart palpitations..."

Williams checked his notes. "Mm, you forgot to mention a few, Doctor." He said with a hint of correction. "Let me read them for the benefit of the jury so there is no mistake. Other serious side effects include: self-injury, paranoia, hallucinations, panic, personality changes, delusions and_ aggression_." Williams verbally underlined the last word. "And once the drug is discontinued, how long can these counter-effects last?"

"Days or weeks, it is different from patient to patient. The other drugs have the potential for the same adverse effects but Patrick had showed no sign of them."

"Clear something up for us, Doctor. Do these drugs cause a person to act contrary to their normal patterns of behavior?"

"No, these are not little personalities in pill form. They do in some cases cause a person to act out behaviours already present. For example just as most people have some capacity for fear, a drug such as Rytalin2 can enhance those feelings of fear by acting on the adrenergic – the adrenaline - receptors in the brain.

"What that means is though Rytalin2 was developed to reduce the feelings of anxiety by reducing the amount of adrenaline taken up by the brain, in some people the body responds by flooding the system with massive amounts of adrenaline – it is tantamount to an allergic reaction. Instead of a calming effect, the anxiety or fear or what-have-you increases."#

"So in your professional opinion, in Mister Jane this drug had the opposite effect – the counter-effect – causing him to act aggressively."

"Yes."

"Are you absolutely sure, Doctor?"

"Yes, I am absolutely sure."

Williams granted her a small, indulgent smile. "You're sure? When two other colleagues on staff disagreed with you, noting so in their own reports?"

"It is not unusual for two physicians to disagree on the treatment of a patient with Patrick's type of Post Traumatic Stress. Doctor Field disagreed and so did Doctor Van Brenner but Doctor Mercerau agreed with me."

"Let me quote to you from the report of the doctor's that did _not _agreed with you, Doctor Miller- "

"I am _aware_ of what's in those reports."

Williams ignored her comment and read aloud. "_"In her decision to remove Patrick Jane from the Rytalin2, it is my professional opinion that Doctor Miller is acting in what I can only term as a knee-jerk fashion by removing her patient from the drug __methylphenidate2 before it has had sufficient time to come to its full potency. Although the patient has had two incidents of violence, it is my belief that this aggression is not due to his drug regime either in combination or alone"."_

Williams looked at her. "At the time Patrick Jane was under your treatment, how many years had you worked as a psychiatrist, Doctor?"

"Four years."

"Four years. Doctor Van Brenner had accumulated twenty more years in his psychiatric profession and yet you ignored his opinion."

"I did not ignore it, I considered it and disagreed. Doctor Brenner did not like to deviate from conventional therapy and in Patrick's case, conventional therapy was not working, that's why the board decided to call me in –_ I_ was versed in new therapies."

"How can you be so sure conventional therapy would not have worked in say, another few weeks or months? How can you be sure that Patrick's aggression wasn't simply a part of his natural make-up? He was only under your charge for eighteen weeks, yet you assert that you were able to make that kind of determination with less than five months of knowing him."

"Patrick was in a controlled environment. I saw him almost every day, worked with him six days a week for hours each session. I came to know him very well."

Williams addressed the jury. "Long enough, Doctor Miller claims, to know without a shadow of a doubt that Patrick Jane was not an aggressive man with tendencies toward violence. Long enough that somehow Doctor Miller, by an act of what would seem to me to be a type of osmosis, claims she knew everything about him."

Miller sat forward, blurting out "Patrick was suffering from an allergic reaction to the drug – it's rare but it happens, and even if he wasn't allergic it would have been unethical to keep him on it if that was even a possibility. People can die from allergic reactions."

Williams did not turn an eyelash to her outburst. "Are you sure that's what it was, Doctor. Did you have any allergy tests performed on Patrick, to determine if that was the case?"

"It wasn't necessary. We determined –"

"Excuse me Doctor – "We"?"

"_I _determined that Rylatin2 was the most likely cause of his aggression. It was the last drug I put him on and it was logical that_ it_ was causing the changes in his behavior. Removing it from his regime was the proper decision."

"In your judgment and no one else's?"

Miller lifted her chin. "_I _was his doctor, so yes, in _my_ judgment."

"Do you admire Patrick, Doctor Miller?"

"Yes. Mister Jane has done very well for himself."

Williams addressed the jury and Miller, walking back and forth between them, drawing everyone into his argument. "You are a medical professional, Doctor Miller, who since the time Patrick was under your care has been involved in medical research of a decidedly unethical nature. In other words, you were convicted of falsifying research data, making-up laboratory results in order to protect the reputation of another doctor - a scientist – a man whom you also "admired". Tell me, Doctor, do you like Mister Jane? Do you perhaps find him attractive?"

"What does that have to do with-?"

"Answer the question please."

"I don't see the poi-"

Williams sighed heavily over this most trying witness. "Your Honor, will you please instruct the witness to answer the question."

Gilpin, chin in hand, "The witness is so instructed. Answer the question, Doctor Miller."

"I don't see the relevance but yes, Patrick is an attractive man."

"And you were fond of him? You felt _sorry_ for him. You wanted to help him."

"Of course I wanted to help him. He was my patient and he was suffering. Patrick was in serious emotional trouble. I want to help_ all_ my patients."

"During his time under your care, you took Patrick on two day-trips and you also spent double the required hours in session with him than with any other of your patients during those months. _Double the hours_, doctor. Can you explain this discrepancy?"

"Yes. There was hope for Patrick."

"So you did not hold out any hope for any of your other patients? Seems a little like favoritism to me."

"Of _course_ not. It may seem callous but often a doctor has to make a choice between spending years of therapeutic treatment and - yes - _funds_ treating a hopeless case or spending those _same_ energies on one with a good chance of recovery, a chance that they'll be able to reclaim their health and life. I made an ethical choice to help one whom I knew I _could_ help provided I put in the resources and the time."

"And in your opinion, Patrick Jane was such a patient?"

"Yes. He was suffering from an extreme form of survivor's guilt and PTSD but I _knew_ he could be helped. He could get well _if_ I could get him to fight for his life."

""_Help"_." Williams repeated, his tone dripping sarcasm. "Spending double the hours on a single patient we might be able to chalk up to...er..._enthusiasm,_ if you will, for your patient, but a controversial drug and a controversial therapy – this touching therapy – which sounds like hogwash to me, all that touching and more touching, a therapy that is _barely_ recognized in professional circles. And two day-trips, doctor? _Two, _when none of your other patients received even a single outing during those eighteen weeks that Patrick Jane was under your touchy-feely care?"

Miller herself spoke directly to the jury now. "Patrick needed extra attention if there was any hope of getting him out of that place. He would have become just another sad statistic without my help."

Williams raised his eyebrows. "Without_ your_ help? Just yours? _Your_ magic fingers - no one else's was capable of bringing Patrick out of his mental and emotional hole but _you_, Doctor? "You did not take any of your other patient residents in Greenlawn on day-trips. On two day-trips I remind you, with the sole exception of Patrick Jane. And not just _any_ ol' day-trip."

Williams put his hands in his pockets and jingled the coins he found there as though just stumbling upon an interest fact. "Tell me, Doctor Miller, where _were_ these day-trips? Where did you take Patrick? Don't bother answering, I'll tell everyone the kind of therapy Doctor Miller believes in." Williams checked the notes in his hand. "On both occasions you took Patrick to a fancy, high-priced restaurant where you ate steak and drank wine. Isn't that correct, Doctor?"

"Yes." Miller said her voice defiant. "Patrick needed some normalcy. I was trying to remind him that there are things this life worth fighting for."

"Then why not to the Zoo? Or to a nature park, or a museum - or a beach? No. You bought him a new suite and then took him on a fancy, adult oriented and rather intimate dinner, wining and dining him complete with candle-light."

"I didn't take him to a public place because in public places there are often children present and at that time I didn't think it would good for Patrick to be expo-"

"-And the new clothes? The expensive suit? And new shoes as well? Were _they_ part of your one-on-one therapy, too, Doctor?"

Miller sighed, sat back and rubbed her temples. "Look, I can see where you're trying to take this but Patrick had no clothes with him at Greenlawn. His home was the scene of an ongoing crime investigation – we did not have the keys and even if we had, we would not have been permitted to enter the house. I had to buy him the clothes. It was either that or Greenlawn pajamas, and I did not want him to feel humiliated in public."

"And the institute paid for them?"

"Of course not. Allowance for such extras were not in the budget. I paid for them."

"Oh, you paid for them? So why not jeans and a sweater? Why not a hot-dog stand for that matter? Why a new and fairly expensive suit and an equally expensive intimate dinner – let me tell you, that's _some_ therapy doctor. That's some "admiration". My own _wife_ doesn't admire me that much."

"By the way, not that you care, obviously, about my medical reasoning, but I did not allow Patrick to drink wine, it would have interfered with his med's."

"Two lovely evening's out was part of your therapy. I see. Let's talk about this therapy, this touching-the-patient therapy of yours. – was it conducted in a group setting?"

"No, it was always conducted in my office."

"Just the two of you – touching and touching some more. That seems a little unnecessarily intimate as well, Doctor. Tell me, how did Patrick feel to you? Did he feel...you know – _good_?"

Selby stood. "Objection!"

"Sustained." Gilpin said, sounding weary. "Watch yourself, counselor."

"Certainly your Honor - my apologies." Williams said cheerfully, though delighted to have snuck the colorful comment in. "Never-the-less Doctor Miller, from what we've heard thus far it sounds to me like you were a little more fond of Patrick than you'd care to admit. From your prescribed therapies you seemed to me to have been enamored with him. I put it to you that you liked Patrick beyond the realm of physician/patient. You liked him so much in fact, you were willing to stretch the rules and your own ethical boundaries and ignore those little parts of Patrick's personality that did not fit in with your fantasies about what kind of man he was. I put it to you that you chose to ignore his violent tendencies, and that instead you wanted to protect him as one does a lover and not a patient."

"That's ridiculous. You're ignoring all the medical evidence and trying to-"

"-When was his first assault at Greenlawn? Before or after you started the regime of Rytalin2?"

"Before. But it was only natural for Patrick to have been displaying some anger at that time –"

"There seems to be an inordinate number of "but's' in your testimony Doctor Miller."

Miller sat forward once more, appealing to the jury. "_Please_ listen to me." She pleaded. "At that time Patrick was only just beginning to show emotion again – he had gone through a terrible ordeal – he came home to find his wife and young daughter murdered - they were left cut up and on display." She thrust a hand out to them. "How would _any_ of you have reacted? Once his emotions were reawakened, it was only natural he would be feeling some anger and acting out at first, but then, shortly after, he began to show some positive, healthy responses."

Williams waved to the jury as though to let them know to momentarily indulge her if they must, and that he was okay with it. "How we can believe any so-called professional opinion of yours, Doctor, when you have been shown to be a liar – a convicted liar?" Williams reminded her. "You _thought_ Patrick was non-violent and you _thought_ it was the drug and you _thought_ Patrick was incapable of hurting anyone – well he _has_ been violent, and he has hurt someone. He committed _murder._ In the light of his violent act against Timothy Carter, can what _you_ think regarding Patrick be taken at all seriously?"

"Because it's the_ truth_, goddamit! I was his doctor. I knew him as my patient and I never touched Patrick inappropriately _- ever._ I respected him too much for that." Miller swallowed her fury and looked across the cold, gleaming floor at the man whose life was being sifted asunder. "And I still do."

Williams returned to his desk. "I myself have the gravest doubts." Williams waved his hand again but this time as a dismissal to everything Miller thought or had even ever spoken. "No more questions, your Honor."

CBI

**Part 6 soon **

*Although Ritalin exists, Rytalin2 does not.

# I am not a doctor – this is mostly bull$hit!


	6. Chapter 6

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 6**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. Mentions of violence.Hurt-comfort.Light humour, and of course Jane-pain. **SMUT in this one!  
><strong>**Characters: **Jane/Lisbon friendship; Jane/Cho  
><strong>Summary: <strong>The trial and the tribulations...  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

"Counsellor, do you wish reprisal?" Gilpin asked Selby.

Selby leaned over and whispered to Patrick. "You got to give Williams his due – the bastard is good."

She stood and answered the judge. "Yes, thank-you your Honour."

Selby approached the flustered witness, using wording and tone designed to soothe over any bad impression William's hard-armed tactics might have left on the jury. "Doctor Miller, you've had recent opportunities to see Patrick again, have you not?"

"Yes. We exchanged business cards the last time we spoke."

"When was that?"

"Two years ago."

"And other than here in this courtroom, have you availed yourself of that corridor? Have you called or seen Patrick or spoken to him even for a minute during that time?"

"No."

"Is there any reason for that?"

"Yes, I have been in a long term relationship for the last year and half. As proud as I am of Patrick and his recovery - and the career he has built for himself, I saw no reason to contact him. We said out goodbyes a long time ago."

"You have recently been given an academic award, isn't that correct?"

"Yes. I was nominated and received the honour of "Best Author in Psychiatric Studies" award from the New York Psychiatric Association in Psychosomatic Medicine."

"A prestigious honour for a psychiatric professional whom my colleague mistakenly believes is anything but." Selby remarked. "And where do you currently reside?"

"In New York. In South Manhattan with my fiancé."

"Five thousand miles away from the man my colleague asserts to be the man of Doctor Miller's secret fantasies – Patrick Jane. For the record I would like to repeat that Mister Jane currently resides in Sacramento, California and has done so for the last five years."

Selby then addressed the jury very much as her colleague did, with resounding confidence. "Five thousand miles apart, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, _five thousand miles_ and _no_ contact for two years and counting. That's hardly what I call a romance. It's hardly even a fantasy, is it? No further questions your Honour."

Judge Gilpin banged down his gavel. "Then we will break for lunch." He looked at his watch. "It is currently 12:30 PM. Court will resume at 2:30."

CBI

People filed out of the courtroom, heading to the restrooms, elevators or stairs. Lisbon caught up to Sophie Miller just as she was about to step onto an elevator car. "Doctor Miller."

Miller turned. "Agent Lisbon." They shook hands briefly.

"I just wanted to say, well, thank you" Lisbon stuttered, her old and what she thought dead jealousy roused within her chest just a little. How many other women were there in Jane's past that still had tentacles reaching out for him in the present? Yet on the stand Miller had insisted she and Patrick, if there ever was anything between them outside of the professional, were over.

Miller could not help but glance over to where Jane was speaking with his lawyer in a private corner of the hallway, her eyes lingering, and Lisbon could not help but notice Miller notice him."I mean for being here," Lisbon said to draw Miller's attention off of him and back onto her. "And for trying to help Jane."

"I'm not sure how much help I was." She raised one ironic eyebrow. "I hope like hell Selby knows what she's doing with this insanity defence. I'm surprised Patrick went along with it at all.' Miller offered. "He's...sensitive to that idea – being thought of as anything other than, well, _sane_."

"Yes, I guess so." Lisbon didn't really. She had known about his time in the mental ward - Jane had told her himself - but this trial was the first time she'd heard the awful details of it. "Well, thanks again."

Miller nodded. "You'll take care of him for me, won't you?" She said in parting.

Lisbon watched her walk away, thinking how interesting it was that the woman had phrased it not so much a request but as an agreement. A mutual understanding.

Then Lisbon turned her eyes on Jane who was shaking his head at something his lawyer was saying. Selby appeared a bit frustrated with him. Lisbon could well sympathise.

Rigsby, after a bathroom break, joined her. "How do you think it's going?" He asked; his eyes on Jane as well. Jane and his lawyer were still arguing about something.

Lisbon wanted to be optimistic but as far as she could tell so far the prosecution's case was devastating. It didn't look good for their mentalist. "I hate to say it but I think Jane is going to go to jail."

Selby excused herself from her most recalcitrant client and headed for the women's bathroom.

Lisbon said to Rigsby. "Hey, why don't you go over and be encouraging to Jane for a minute."

"And say what?"

"I don't know, think of something. He looks like he could use a friend. Just tell him...tell him we're behind him."

Rigsby frowned at the task. Jane could smell pandering a mile off, but he went anyway.

Lisbon waited for Selby to finish in the stall and began speaking just as the woman exited. "Tell me your grand plan, Selby." Lisbon said. "Tell me your great scheme to get Jane off this murder charge because as far as I can see, you're out there losing big time."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Agent Lisbon." Selby said sarcastically, washing her hands.

"Come on." Lisbon leaned against the sink as Selby dried between her fingers. "Williams has taken apart every witness you've put on the stand so far, including me. How are you going t-?"

"-Agent Lisbon, a courtroom is a theatre. It's a play, a bloody stage show, and right now, Williams is front and centre but that will change. Trust me; we'll get the spot-light back soon enough. The only thing is..."

"What?" Lisbon asked, hearing the uncertainty in Selby's voice. "The only thing is what?"

"I have to put Patrick Jane on the stand and he's refusing to dance for me."

"What does that mean?"

Selby tossed the used paper towel in the trash and turned to her, crossing her arms. "It means he's refusing to play up his part; the part of a man who had gone temporarily insane and shot Joshua Neil to death. Jane on the stand also means that Williams can cross-question him which is a risk, and believe me, in a murder trial, it's a big, big risk."

Lisbon was curious. It had been niggling at her since this all began. "Do_ you_ think Jane is guilty?"

"Yes, but it doesn't matter what I think. What matters is what I can get the jury to think. And if Patrick forces me pull out the big guns..." Selby shook her head.

"What do you mean?" Lisbon asked, worry joining curiosity now. ""Big guns"?"

Selby's cellular beeped for her. She looked at the tiny screen for a moment, frowned at the words written there, and then said "It means I'm Patrick's lawyer and_ that_ means I'll do anything or _every_thing to see that Patrick does no jail time, and it would be a lot easier to do that if he was more cooperative." Selby sighed, re-reading the text message. "Odd." She muttered, then said to Lisbon "I'm tired Agent, and hungry and I have testimony to go over with Patrick and only this lunch hour to do it, so can we pick this up later?"

"Yes." Lisbon let her go, a dozen questions unanswered.

"Jane not cooperating. That's nothing new." She repeated to herself softly, leaving the bathroom and finding her agents again. Rigsby looked uncomfortable and Jane looked...exhausted but was making every attempt to ignore his lawyer's talking in his ear as much as possible. None of that was a new state of affairs either.

Lisbon wished she could speak to him privately and to talk some sense into him. The thought of Jane disappearing from her life inside a correctional center for the next twenty years left Lisbon feeling hollow and sick.

When Lisbon was within earshot Rigsby was evidently taking his leave of them. When he saw Lisbon approach, he explained. "Heading back to the office, boss."

"Right." Lisbon said. "See you there later." Cho was standing opposite Jane, staring at him with the oddest expression on his face. Jane didn't seem to notice or was doing his best to act like he didn't.

"Cho?" Lisbon asked. "You all right?"

Cho's features shifted back to their standard mask of unflappable. "Sure."

Lisbon turned her attention back to Jane. "How are you doing?"

Jane shrugged. "Oh, you know how it is."

"Not really. How. Are. You?"

Jane's eyes shifted to his shoes. He shrugged again but this time it wasn't his habitual shrug as though he didn't care. Jane cared. He cared very much that he might be losing his freedom on for all intents and purposes a permanent basis. The shrug was his way of saying that he was at the mercy of events over which he had no hold, and could do nothing to circumvent. Not this time.

Either that or he was hiding up his sleeve a Get Out Of Jail Free card.

"I'm hungry." Lisbon announced. "Who's with me?" Although only three members of it were present, it might be their last meal together as a team.

Jane rolled on his heels, ignoring the stern look from his lawyer. "Anyone up for Dim Sum?" He asked.

Selby said "Patrick, we need to go over-"

"No we don't." He said, cutting her off rudely.

Cho asked Jane. "You buying?" It was good to see Jane smile.

They ate Dim Sum and, while his lawyer stewed over the wasted lunch hours, they joked around as though this wasn't an out-of-the-ordinary day, as though there was no trial or testimony for Jane to give and maybe, just maybe, if he was lucky or his present but miffed lawyer was smart enough, he would stay out of jail and keep his freedom. They acted normal in a situation where it was impossible to feel normal.

In the wood-polished arena replete with supposed truths, they lied to themselves.

CBI

On the way back to the courthouse, Selby insisted Jane ride with her and Lisbon and the others let him reluctantly. It was, however, in Jane's best interests to let his lawyer have her way.

Once in the taxi, Selby directed the driver to close the partition. Once they were secluded Selby opened her phone, scrolled to the appropriate message, turned to Jane and showed him what the display read.

Jane looked and glanced away.

"Is this from who I think it's from?" She asked him. "_R.J_?" She prompted. "_Red John_." The last was not a question.

Jane turned his lips downward in mock contemplation. "Him or Reggie Jackson."

"What does Red John know about what's going on that you haven't told me?" Selby pushed. "Because if Red John knows something, from everything I've learned from you and the things I've read about it, you would _have_ to be in the know right along with him." She reasoned. "Because Red John doesn't do anything these days without making sure you know about it." At his silence she added. "After the personal horrors he's put you through, why would you protect him now?"

That solicited a swift response. "I'm _not_ protecting Red John." He snapped, then turned his eyes toward the street cars and the pedestrians all walking through their innocent and ordinary day. "I don't know what that message means or if it's from him."

Selby did not believe him. She sat back for a moment, idly watching the street signs. They were only blocks from the courthouse now. She made a decision. Locating Teresa Lisbon's email in her contact list, she forwarded the message to her, plus adding her own: _"Lisbon – do U have NE idea what this means?"_

Selby said to Jane "Maybe Lisbon knows." She looked at him. "What do you think?"

Jane very carefully did not react. "Nothing." He answered. "She'll know nothing."

Selby shook her head at her most stubborn client. "You know, Patrick, sooner or later you're going to have to trust someone. Your_ lawyer_ - you know? The person who's fighting to save your _ass_ - would be a good place to start."

CBI

Lisbon sat near the bottom of the steps of the courthouse, enjoying the early afternoon sunshine and the heat rising off the sidewalk. Her phone trilled. She had a message from Selby. Lisbon read the confusing words just above a whisper. _"I told you,"_ the first message read, _"That your insolence would not go unpunished."_ Selby's message of inquiry followed.

Lisbon felt coldness creeping into her warm sidewalk. Of course this had to do with Red John. She should have guessed that much. Of course, Jane was keeping closed mouthed about it, not even being forthright with his lawyer. There were three persons in the universe to which one should always speak the whole truth: your priest, your god...

And your attorney.

Lisbon knew the message was from Red John but that was all. As to it meaning or what ought to be done about it, she had no idea. Lisbon finally settled on telling Selby what she did know. She typed a short text and sent it. _"For sure sent from Red John. Meaning? Jane knows if U can make him talk. Lots of luck."_

CBI

"State your name and occupation for the record please." Selby asked using her most congenial voice thus far.

Jane was seated in the witness box, his body leaning slightly forward so he could put his folded hands on the wooden partition before him. For a man on trial for murder he appeared relaxed enough. Only Selby could see the tiny up and down bounce of his right knee. "Patrick Jane." He said. "I'm a crime consultant with the California Bureau of Investigation, Homicide Division. I've held that post for just over four years."

"Thank you, Patrick." Selby said, looking toward the jury as she addressed her client. "We've all heard from other witnesses about your life experiences that have led you to this day, now we want to hear from you. Tell us, Patrick, in some details exactly what happened to you that day and evening – that fateful day when your family was murdered?"

Jane looked away from his lawyer to the jury and then the audience, all waiting on the edge of their seats for the gruesome tale. "At about 8:30 Pm, we had just finished the broadcast-"

"The television show where you appeared as a psychic?" Selby prompted. Selby glanced at the judge. "It is a matter of record, your Honour." She said so Jane would not have to reiterate.

Gilpin nodded.

"Yes. That was how I made my living back then, I went around the State and did live performances plus I was also doing some work with local authorities, helping them solve crimes, cold cases, kidnappings, things like that."

"_Are_ you a psychic, Patrick?"

Jane shook his head a little "No. There are no such things as psychics, I was...pretending – it was all an act."

"You were a performer. You had worked alongside your father for many years in carnival's before you left home." Selby ran-down a bit of her client's colourful history. "It's where you learned and plied your so-called psychic abilities, you also learned magic, trickery, and became quite adept at all of it, isn't that correct? In these skills you in fact became one of the top in your field." She recited.

Patrick nodded. "Yes."

Selby stood near her client protectively. "So you were on television, the broadcast was over, and then what?"

Patrick shrugged. "I went home."

Selby could see her client already shifting his mind into neutral, shutting down the memories, stomping on them so they could not rise up once more and leave their awful markings upon his soul.

That would not do. She asked very gently "And what did you find there?"

Jane stared at Selby, knowing this is what his lawyer had spent days preparing him for, but now the moment had arrived and he found his will numb, his perceptions skewed with grief, his tongue immovable, as was almost inevitable when the faces of his wife and daughter loomed before him, one moment living, the next bloody corpses.

That morning nine years ago had been like many other mornings; just his daughter going off to school and his wife cleaning up the breakfast dishes, asking him if he was sure he really wanted to start "this television thing", and that it worried her that he was going back to the con' after they had struggled so hard to leave that life behind. Next had come his foolish reassurance to her that it was just another job, that everything would be fine, besides it was good money, he would be home a little late, but he would tuck charlotte in bed like he did most nights. Charlotte would tell him about her day, some of it in secret whispers so mommy wouldn't hear; little girl things for them alone; the picture she drew him, the games at recess, and the little brown-eyed boy that she liked...

Between conscious breaths that he worked hard to make enter and leave his lungs, Jane found he could not speak a word other than to say "They were dead."

Selby placed one kind hand on Patrick's two and asked gently, hoping to coax it out of him with warm eyes and a touch. "What had happened to them, Patrick? I know this is difficult...what did you see?"

Jane stared at her, and pulled his hands from beneath hers. His eyes were distant, his manner perfunctory. "They had been murdered."

"And how did that make you feel?"

Jane tried not to laugh at the inane question, even though he knew it had been coming. "Angela was my wife. Charlotte was my daughter. How do you _think_ it made me feel?" He was angry with nowhere to vent it but at her. "I went crazy. I tried to..." But it was too much. Jane closed his eyes and shut it all down, the pictures of them, torn white flesh and streaks of arterial blood, their hair brushed and their flowered dresses carefully arranged, piano music playing in the background, the lamp tilted to spot-light the red slashes on the wall in the shape of a mocking smile dripping obscenely, announcing to anyone who looked that they were dead and it was his fault. At this day and hour the fact that there had been a killer who wielded the knife felt somehow almost incidental.

"I...there...it was _my_ fault." He said and Selby knew that was it. That was all she was going to get out of him on the subject and inside she cursed him a blue streak.

"Patrick, I understand this is very hard for you to-" she began as a last valiant effort - hopeless but valiant.

"_No_." He looked at her, absolutely adamant. "What happened that night, what they..._looked_ like is for me and _not_ for you or a room full of strangers."

Selby sighed, trying to keep her cool. Did the jackass _want_ to go to jail? Temporarily defeated, she turned and said to Williams "Your witness, counsellor."

CBI


	7. Chapter 7

**LITTLE RED LIES Part 7**

**Author: **G. Waldo  
><strong>Rating: <strong>Case-fic'. Some angst. Mentions of humour, and of course Jane-pain.**  
><strong>**Characters: **Jane/Lisbon friendship  
><strong>Summary: <strong>The trial and the tribulations...  
><strong>Disclaimer: <strong>Not mine though I wish he was.

CBI

Williams stole a puzzled look at his opponent, started to rise and then sat back down when Judge Gilpin spoke up. He looked a little confused, too. "Ms. Selby, are you _certain_ that is all the questions you have for your client at this point in time?"

"Actually your honour," Selby said, respectfully standing up. "If it pleases the court, I request a short recess to confer with my client, thereafter Mister Williams may resume his questioning if he so pleases. I know this is an unusual time for such a recess but I am appealing to your good will. I will keep it as brief as possible. Fif-_twenty_ minutes, your Honour, that's all."

Gilpin thought for a few seconds, and then nodded. "Twenty minutes. Make them good ones, counsellor."

Selby steered her client from the courtroom and, other would-be toilet-users be-damned, directly into the women's washroom. "What the hell are you doing?" She snarled. "You are going to _jail_, Patrick. Do you comprehend how serious this is? Because this time it'll be a Federal Institution and, considering that little break out you did, possibly solitary confinement. Think you can sneak away from that? Think again!"

Jane thrust a hand back toward washroom door and the court room beyond. "I won't be made to discuss my murdered family's corpses before a room full of strangers who are only there for the gore."

Selby took a deep breath. "If there was any other way..."

"_Find_ one."

Lisbon entered. "What the hell is going on?"

Jane threw his lawyer an angry glare. "Excuse me. I believe I'm in the wrong bathroom." He said and left them alone.

Lisbon looked at Selby, waiting for an explanation. Selby gave her one. "_That's_ what I mean about him not playing his part. We're drowning and _he's_ stirring the water."

"It's hard for him to talk about those days. It drives him crazy."

Selby huffed, crossing her arms. "Yeah, I am aware. How hard do you think it's going to be for him in jail for twenty years? Unable to continue his hunt for Red John? Unable to do anything but become some 'roided-out freak's little blonde bitch?"

"There must be a way to do this without hurting him." Lisbon said. She had never seen Jane so on the edge before. Something was eating him alive.

Selby sighed and leaned against the salmon coloured counter. "We seem to do a lot of this in the bathroom, look," she said. "It's obvious you care about him, but if Jane stands on principle, he is going to go to jail. And right now the jury is seeing robot-man up there, emotionless, withdrawn. I get why he's that way - who _wouldn't_ be hiding? But he needs to be humanized-" Selby put up a hand at the look that came over Lisbon's face "I know he _is_ human, but the jury doesn't see him that way and what they see means _everything_. I have got to find a way to bring out the vulnerable, broken, and messed-up in the head Jane or we're lost. And honestly? It may already be too late."

Lisbon hated herself for saying it. "Maybe I can help?"

Selby thought it over for a moment, and then told her.

Lisbon called the office and Van Pelt answered. Lisbon explained what she needed and where she needed it faxed to.

At the other end of the line, Van Pelt paused. She sounded puzzled. "Are you sure that's what you need, boss?"

"Yes, and as fast as possible. We're on the clock."

CBI

William announced. "I would like to call Kimball Cho to the stand, your Honour."

Cho and Lisbon exchanged glances. "Screw 'em." She whispered to Cho as he stood. In other words, give Williams back as good as he gives. Among his peers Cho had a reputation for being not only a first class interrogator but insufferably inscrutable. This ought to be interesting, Lisbon thought.

Williams started simply. "You have worked with Mister Jane for four years, have you Mister Cho?"

"Yes."

"And would you say that he is an honest man?"

"Like most people, he is honest most of the time."

"Most of the time?" Williams asked.

"Well, I doubt you're honest all the time."

"You barely know me, Mister Cho."

"You're a _lawyer_; I don't have to know you."

That elicited a small round of chuckles in the courtroom and Williams cleared his throat loudly to quell it. ""How well do you really know Patrick Jane?"

"Well enough."

Williams frowned, thinking. "Well enough to know when he is lying and when he is telling the truth? Each time? Every time?"

"Well enough to know that when he has lied, he did it to catch a killer or to protect the team."

"How often do you see Mister Jane outside of work?"

"Almost never. Jane's a private person."

Williams smiled to himself. "Mister Cho, now I can understand that you want to be loyal to your – er – friend, and that you understand that he on trial for murder but, we know you and he spent a great deal of time together outside of work. More than anyone. Do you deny this?"

"No, but whatever time we may have spent was for work. We put in over-time. We follow up leads. We do surveillance - often all night. Jane and I are sometimes unofficially partnered up for the police work we do."

"Unofficially?"

"Jane is a contract consultant. Agent Rigsby and Agent Van Pelt are partners, most of the time Agent Rigsby and I are partners but sometimes it's Jane and me. It varies depending on what needs to be done."

""Partners". Williams said. "I see. But isn't it true that Lisbon often assigns to you, for lack of a better word, babysitting duty over Mister Jane because of his tendency to misbehave, disobey orders, disappear for hours at a time with no word, even interrogate suspects he had been ordered to stay away from?"

"Are you asking for specific occasions?"

"I'm speaking in general terms."

"Then, speaking in general terms, you're incorrect. But if you want specifics I can give them to you."

Williams rubbed his lip. "Do you like Mister Jane?"

"Well enough."

"But he's likeable, isn't he? He gives nice gifts, he takes the team out to dinner, he brings in pastries and fruit to the office; he does a lot of that – gift-giving."

"Is that a question?"

Abruptly changing tactics, Williams turned on Cho and spat out. "How long have you and Mister Jane been involved in a romantic relationship?"

Cho looked at him like he was insane. "I-I _beg_ your pardon?"

"_Involved_." Williams underlined the word. "Sexually? How long?"

"Are you _nuts?_"

Lisbon heard the sincerity in Cho's voice. He really believed what he was saying. Cho didn't remember his involvement with Jane and she instantly knew why.

"Mister Cho, you are under oath. And we have gleaned-"

"-Who's "we"?" Cho asked.

Williams snapped. "The prosecution, my team, has gleaned information. Gleaned means gathered, analyzed, derived..."

Cho interrupted "Or it means deducing a _conclusion_, taking _part_ from a whole or picking out for a _reason_. What _conclusion_ your team _deduced_ for whatever_ reason_ from whatever _part_ is wrong. Jane and I have never been involved physically or romantically. We're friends and team-mates and that's all."

The prosecutor coughed, realizing that his team had made a gross miscalculation. He would have to decide which one of them would end up on the street looking for a new post.

Williams, seasoned enough as a prosecutor to know when to cut his losses, said to the Judge. "No more questions your Honour."

Cho returned to his seat and Lisbon asked him. "Are you all right?"

Cho shook his head. "Massive headache. What the hell was all that about?"

Lisbon looked at the back of Jane's head. He was sitting very stiffly with his eyes on his hands. Not directly answering Cho "Jane's probably up next." She said.

"I call Mister Patrick Jane once more to the stand." Williams announced and said then to the judge "If it pleases your Honour, we have a short film to show the jury before I begin my questioning."

In her seat Selby whispered to Jane. "Here it comes." Jane turned his eyes to the viewing screen already set up opposite the jury box. It was angled so most of the onlookers would have a clear view as well.

Gilpin asked. "I am assuming the defence has knowledge of this – do you have any objection Ms. Selby?"

Selby stood long enough to say. "No your Honour. No objection." She couldn't very well protest on prejudicial grounds, because if she did then her own planned presentation might be disallowed. If Williams was going to have his little horror show, then so would she.

Williams sat down as the film ran.

It was without sound but Lisbon, seated directly behind the defence's table, had a front row view and instantly recognised it as the scene from the mall over a full year previous. The images were of poor quality from a cheap tape-recorded surveillance but it showed a still recognizable Jane approaching the man, Timothy Carter, who was seated at a cafe' table reading his paper. The two men began to speak. Jane then sat down opposite him, as though they were friends. They spoke for many minutes before the fellow rose and, in the footage appearing unarmed, began to walk away. Jane then followed and the man turned. Jane spoke again, the man answered and then his body jerked, convulsing as Jane fired three bullets into his chest. The man fell. As the other patrons ran for cover Jane placed the gun carefully beside the body and resumed his seat, sipping his tea, appearing calm in every way. Lastly Jane spoke a few words to a waitress cowering nearby, and the film ended, freeze-framed on the image of Jane enjoying his post-murder tea, the bleeding body of Timothy Carter lying nearby.

Williams resumed his speech. "This, as some of you may already be aware, was the murder of Timothy Carter, the man Mister Jane was charged with murdering_ last_ year." Williams underlined the word "last" as though with Jane murder was a yearly event. "True, Mister Jane was acquitted yet we see him pulling the trigger on a gun and very clearly shooting Timothy Carter, killing him.

"Now we are not here to re-open that murder case but we are here to try to understand the mind of Patrick Jane and those things that motivate him. Number one on that list is revenge, something of which he has spoken about to his colleague on more than one occasion. Mister Jane shot this man Timothy Carter because he thought he was Red John. This was a _revenge_ killing in which Mister Jane partook.

"Now my colleague would have you believe that Mister Jane experienced temporary insanity when he killed Joshua Neil, yet I ask you," Williams pointed to the frozen image on the screen. "Does that appear to be a man who is out of his mind? Does he appear disturbed to you – even remorseful? Not to me, he doesn't. He appears calm and collected through-out. Hardly the actions of a crazy man. Hardly the actions of man full of uncontrollable insanity, wouldn't you say? I in fact see no emotion of any kind. I see a man satisfied with his act of violence. I see a man in the prime of his life with total command over himself and making the _decision_ to kill."

Williams pointed to Jane still seated in the witness box. "I see Mister Patrick Jane committing murder, just as he did against Joshua Neil only months ago. I see a perfectly sane man, not a crazy man. I see a man with a temper who keeps himself under strict control until the hour he needs to summon it up enough to destroy another human being."

Williams looked at the jury, his eyes going over each of their faces one by one. "If you are reasonable, intelligent people and I am in no doubt that you are, that is what you see as well. But you know what –why don't we ask him?" Williams spun on Jane and began pounding him with evidence. "You believed Timothy Carter was an accomplice of Red John, but you were wrong, you believed Joshua Neil was an accomplice of Red John but you were wrong. You believe Red John had accomplices everywhere. Who _else_ are you going to shoot Mister Jane?"

Selby stood. "Objection!"

Williams waved a casual hand in her direction. "Withdrawn. But really Mister Jane..." Williams continued, "Accomplices everywhere? One to a tree it seems? Your little game of revenge seems to have gotten out of hand."

"It's not a game to Red John, and we have documented cases of those who were Red John's accomplices who have killed law enforcement officers. Red John has eyes and ears and he uses them. It's a power-control thing." It was the longest series of sentences Jane had spoken since the beginning of the trial.

"Eyes and ears." Williams scoffed. "You are paranoid, aren't you Mister Jane?"

"No, just experienced."

"This obsession you have for this killer has been your undoing. Why would this Red John need to watch you, as you say? That's –"

"Insane?" Jane asked. "I'm not insane. But I know Red John likes to keep tabs on me. I know he watches me or has others watch me. One of his loyal supporters could be in this courtroom right now watching me."

From where she sat Lisbon could hear Selby gasp and drop her pen so it rattled off the table. Jane had said the words. He had stated that he was _not_ insane. Lisbon suddenly felt sorry for Selby.

Jane was looking pointedly at Williams. "Or he's watching _you_ watch me. Red John wants to keep the control he thinks he has over me to himself." Jane explained the thought processes of a killer to a man who had never had occasion to fear for his life until the day he brought a charge of murder against one Patrick Jane. "Red John doesn't like it when other people...interfere with me. He gets upset when those within the circle of my life, whoever they are, hurt me or cause me damage without his.._.permission_."

Jane's unbroken stare was a sad, sober warning. "You're in that circle now, Mister Williams by virtue of being the prosecutor in this case. Red John will have his eyes on you, too. You've become another player in his psychopathic game, just like the rest of us."

Williams coughed once and turned his back on Jane boldly dismissing the warning he had just been given. "Let us stick to the facts of the case shall we Mister Jane? And the facts are _your _fingerprints are_ on_ the murder weapon. It was found _beneath_ the victim's body. Do you _deny_ these facts?"

Jane rubbed his forehead with two fingers, and it was the most emotion he had thus far displayed after being in the witness box for the last twenty minutes with William's hither and yon throwing of facts. "No."

"_Your_ blood,_ your_ DNA was found on the belt buckle of the victim, Joshua Neil, which was on the body, proving beyond any shadow of a doubt that you were present, near the victim, so close as to get your blood on him, so close as to leave behind your own DNA, your own personal genetic fingerprint of evidence, proving you knew the victim – well enough to want to wish him dead. Do you deny _these_ facts?"

Jane was staring at the row of windows along the east wall. Outside the sun was in the sky shining down merrily. "No." He said.

Williams nodded to himself. "There you have it, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, _no_ denial of the facts, _no_ denial that he knew the victim, and _no_ denial of the _crime_. You have no choice but to find Mister Jane guilty of Murder in the First Degree. This was planned, premeditated murder. No more questions your Honour."

Once Williams was seated Judge Gilpin asked Selby. "Counsellor, you've had your twenty minutes, are you ready to continue?"

"Yes, your honour. I am just waiting for a package, it should be here momentarily."

"But you can begin?" Gilpin asked, growing weary of delays.

"Er - yes." Selby would keep the ball rolling until the courier showed up. She approached Jane. His clothing was neat, his suit buttoned respectfully for the court and the judge, his hair in place, his face slack and his eyes, at least from a distance, calm. Everything about him in fact on his exterior upheld Williams' assertion that there was nothing wrong what-so-ever with Patrick Jane.

But after spending months with him off and on, going over testimony, reading about his past, learning about Red John and what he had done to Patrick and others, and pondering over everything that had happened to Jane and to those he cared about since the murder of his family, even since being with the CBI spoke a wholly different story.

Selby didn't think Patrick was insane but he should be. Anyone would be and Selby didn't think the jury understood that yet. "Patrick, right now I have just a few questions for you and after I want the jury to listen..." The courtroom doors opened, interrupting her as a man was passed through them. It was an entrance security person holding a thick envelope in his hand. Court security met him halfway up the aisle and the first fellow said something to the guard. The guard nodded, taking the envelope.

"Excuse me, judge." Selby walked to meet the guard, taking the envelope and thanking him. Selby dumped its contents out onto her table. "If you'll bear with me one moment your Honour."

She sorted out what she needed and approached the female technician who had run the mall footage for Williams, handing her a series of photos and whispering to her for a moment. The tech' girl nodded, readying her equipment.

"As I was saying, I want the jury to watch and listen as I explain some things that I believe have been overlooked."

Williams, as though on cue, stood. "Objection! Your Honour, may we approach?"

Selby accompanied Williams to the bench. Williams looked nervous. "Your Honour,' Williams said, "I have been given no prior knowledge of ...whatever this is...I assume photographs, and I would like to see them."

Selby said "Certainly your Honour, if Mister Williams would like, he is of course welcome."

Williams took the photos back from the tech' woman and went through them. He brought them with him to the bench. "Your Honour, these are prejudicial and may negatively influence the jury to the defence's case."

"Let me see them." Gilpin asked and Williams handed the photos to him, Gilpin purveying them for a moment. "They are...disturbing, Mister Williams, but hardly prejudicial. These have nothing to do with the Joshua Neil murder, although I'm not certain I see the reason Ms. Selby wishes to show them to the jury?" Making his last comment a question.

Selby accepted the photos back. "Mister Williams wished to show the state of Patrick Jane's mind and what motivates him, your Honour, I'm simply trying to do the same. And you _did_ allow the film..."

"I am fully _aware_ of what I have allowed." Gilpin said with a frown, and then with grudging respect. "Very clever of you Ms. Selby." He looked at Williams with his hands spread. "Objection overruled, Mister Williams. The photos are allowed."

As the photos were made ready to show to the jury, Gilpin announced. "I would advise those in the courtroom that if you have any children present, I _strongly_ recommend you take them elsewhere for the duration of the viewing of these photos which shall commence once Ms. Selby has completed her questioning of the accused."

Selby approached Jane boldly. She was not playing the sympathetic defence attorney, nor the concerned friend. It was time for complete and, if necessary, brutal interrogation. "You have testified that Red John has taken you twice Mister Jane."

Jane nodded. "Yes. And Agent Lisbon once." He reminded her.

"Yes, we are already aware of that." Selby assured him and the jury. "Staring with the first abduction, what did Rd John do to you Mister Jane?"

Jane fidgeted in his seat. "He beat me." He said simply.

"How?"

Jane stared at his lawyer. "What do you mean how?"

Selby spread her hands. "Well, did he use a wrench, a brick, a stick? How did he beat you? What specifically did he do to you?"

"He starved me for four days-"

"Did he bind you? Drug you? Remove your clothing and cut you? What?"

Lisbon closed her eyes, listening to Selby lay out the stark-raving words describing a time the horror of which the pampered defence attorney could not hope to comprehend. Whenever Lisbon remembered those terrible hours in Red John's hand, she felt shame that at the time she was glad Red John had not done to her what he had done to Jane, and then immediately felt more shame for letting herself think _that_. But the fear had gotten hold of her in that awful room and the baser of her human self had come out; terror, weakness and the human instinct for self preservation.

Lisbon comforted herself sometimes by also remembering that she had screamed and begged Red John to stop hurting Jane, and Red John altogether ignoring her.

Suddenly Lisbon was back in that terrifying place and Jane, sitting in the witness box looking like he was in shock, undoubtedly in some form was too.

Jane looked away from Selby to the jury. "All of them." He whispered. There was no need for a minute by minute replay. Selby knew the details of his time under Red John's merciless hands. The handbook of Red John had sat on her desk for weeks and Selby had already memorized every one of the killer's dirty deeds.

Selby leaned in, a hand unnecessarily placed next to her ear. "I'm sorry we can't hear you, Mister Jane. Would you please speak up?"

"I said _all_ of them." Jane said louder.

"All of them?" Selby repeated. "So he beat you and removed your clothing and cut you, and starved you?"

"Yes."

"Did he rape you as well?"

Jane was silent for a few seconds before he whispered fierce words meant for Selby alone "Go to hell."

Unmoved - "You are required to answer Mister Jane." Selby said. "Did Red John in fact _rape _you?"

Jane sat in stony silence, not looking at her. As an answer it was clear enough.

"I'll take that as a yes." Selby remarked. She stood with her hands clasped in front of her. "But he did something else didn't he? Something that he knew would last as long as the memories of the beatings or his starving you or even the rape. Red John burned you didn't he?"

Jane nodded. "Yes."

Lisbon recalled Jane's screams and his thrashing, and her own screaming at Red John to stop until it became a cacophony of pain of body and agony of soul. And still Red John ignored her, keeping the fire-hot brand against Jane's skin until the flesh below his shoulder smoked and bubbled. During those moments upholding the letter of the law that was so front-and-centre in her career suddenly meant next to nothing. Had she been able to, she would have emptied her gun into Red John happily. Gleefully. And then she would have reloaded and fired again.

"May we see?" Lisbon heard Selby ask the question and closed her eyes for Jane, to spare him at least one set of gaping eyes. Was Selby _trying_ to hurt him now? What good would come from humiliating him?

"No." Jane said, and Lisbon felt proud of him for trying.

Selby walked closer to her client. "Mister Jane, in order for the jury to understand the impact Red John has had on your life and on your body and, if you will, your soul, it is necessary for you to show us."

Jane did not move. "I am _not _going to undress."

"Just your shirt." Selby explained, sounding very reasonable. When he did not move to undo a single button, Selby said to the judge "Your honour, I please ask that you direct the witness to comply with my request."

Gilpin, also looking a little uncomfortable with the direction things were taking in his courtroom never-the-less obliged the defence counsellor. "Mister Jane, you are hereby _ordered_ to remove your shirt."

With eyes of hatred Jane stared at Selby, but he shed his jacket, his movements slow and deliberate, and then unbuttoned his vest and shirt. Finally he took the two flaps of his shirt in his fingers and spread it apart above the waist until the scar was clearly visible.

Selby looked as did everyone in the courtroom.

Though she had been on-site for its making, Lisbon could not help herself but look, too, ashamed of her own weakness where Jane was concerned. Jane's smooth, nicely muscled chest was marred by a puckered circle of red flesh on the left side, just inches above the pink nipple. Although skin grafts had repaired much of the deeper damage, the smiling face of Red John's signature mark could still be made-out. It was a tag of ownership. Red John's morbid art-in-flesh, and a reminder of the killer that Jane would carry for the rest of his life.

Gilpin, fidgeting in his own seat, looked away. His voice sympathetic "Thank you, Mister Jane, you may get dressed now." The judge said.

Once Jane finished dressing, Selby asked. "And what happened the second time Red John took you, this time from your own apartment? More of the same? Beatings? Rapes?"

"No." Jane said. "He..." Jane gathered his thoughts. "He drugged me and beat me and then dumped me off in Sacramento."

"What was the reason for this abduction, do you think?"

"I don't know." Jane said. "I wish I did."

Selby seemed satisfied with that. She walked to the technician lady to ensure things were ready, picked up the remote control for the changing of the photos on the viewer, and then returned to the centre of the courtroom. "We would now like to educate the jury on just who Red John is, specifically what kind of person he is. And we will learn this through his actions, from the things he has done. And once more, prepare yourselves as these are graphic photos."

Selby switched the viewer on and a picture appeared on the screen that caused a collective gasp to spread around the room. "This is, this _was_, Misses Carol Harvey, one of Red John's first victims. She died alone in her house, cut open and put on display in the manner that has become Red John's signature kill. She had, as far as law enforcement has been able to learn, no connection to any criminal activity, she offended no-one, was enemies with no-one. Carol was a daughter, a friend, and according to her relatives, a lovely woman."

The next photo appeared, this time two women. "These women are twin sisters - Janet and Jennie McFadden. One was a cosmetic technician, the other a legal aid. They shared a house that was left to them by their parents. Middle-aged women involved in their community; neighbourhood watch and charity drives. They took vacations together to Hawaii every year. Good citizens. Good people. Dead by Red John's brutal hand."

Selby glanced at Jane, who had his head turned away from the viewer. "There are over two dozen others." Selby explained. "All murdered in their homes and all, as far as any have been able to determine, innocent and undeserving of such a terrible end.

"But it's_ this_ woman," Selby pressed her controller again and a crime scene photo all too familiar to Lisbon appeared on the screen. "Angela Ruskin Jane - that concerns us most today."

Jane whipped his head around and stared at the screen while Lisbon cursed Selby under her breath. This was what she had meant by _the big guns_. "Oh my god..." Lisbon whispered to Cho. "She's using the crime scene photo's." She kept her gaze on Jane as his face transformed from a carefully barricaded facade of calm to the face of a husband staring at the fresh corpse of his murdered wife.

Jane sucked in a breath, with some effort pulling his eyes away from the screen and gluing them to the ledge in front of him, his face crumpling up, tears springing to life and beginning to drip slowly down his face. It was an eerily silent breakdown and Lisbon wanted to kill Selby for it.

"Mister Jane." Selby said her voice more gentle now. She had abandoned her lawyer tone for one closer to human in the face of her client's quiet anguish. "Just for the record - is this your wife?"

Jane did not turn his gaze back to the gruesome photo but kept it on his lawyer who was the orchestrator of his humiliation and pain. "You, you..._why?"_ He asked in a strained whisper.

"Mister Jane –_ is_ this your wife?" Selby asked insistently, and when Jane clamped his mouth shut against her relentless lawyer-speak - "Your Honour would you please instruct the witness to view the photograph and confirm for us whether or not this is Angela Ruskin Jane, the wife of Patrick Jane, the accused?"

Judge Gilpin, himself reluctant to turn his own eyes on the macabre photo, said to Jane "I'm sorry, Mister Jane, I realize it must be painful, but you are hereby instructed to do as your attorney asks."

Jane raised his eyes to the scene he had not looked upon for nine years and counting. Angela Jane's body had been put on display as all the rest of Red John's victims. She had been cut open from pelvis to sternum, her throat slashed so deeply it resembled the gaping grin of a toothless clown. Her dress, however, had been neatly arranged around her knees, and her hands folded across her chest.

Jane stole one lightening fast glance - it was all he needed - and turned away again. "Yes."

Selby asked, this time her voice not so demanding "What do you miss about your wife?"

Jane did not answer her, instead closing his eyes to the reminder of that night, and the horror that had greeted him in his daughter's bedroom where they had both died.

"Mister Jane?" Selby encouraged even more gently. "Tell us about your wife Angela. Please?"

Jane, his eyes squeezed shut so tightly it looked painful, spoke barely above a whisper. It was just audible enough that, shrewdly, Selby did not interrupt him. Her client finally showing human emotions was too valuable an influence over the jury's sympathies. She did not want to screw with this little bit of head-way. "Angie – she" Jane stammered, speaking in jerks and stops, "was my...she was t-the best thing that e-ever happened to me." He said in between shaky breaths. "A w-wonderful mother, a good frien - my _best_ friend, a...better person than me in...e-every way. A good person..._in-innocent_."

"And how did it feel to lose her?"

Jane looked at her, his face pale as a sheet. "I wanted to die." His facial expression, one of pure hatred for his lawyer, added a few silent expletives to his simple statement.

"And as we have already learned when you were in Greenlawn you in fact _attempted_ suicide."

"Yes."

Selby clicked the button on her little remote control of horrors and asked him. "And do you recognise this person?"

Jane looked at his lawyer, stunned. Even Selby, his face seemed to say, would not stoop to putting his daughter's body on display just to gain the jury's sympathy.

"No." He said, and this time it was obvious to Lisbon that he meant it. He had not looked upon his daughter that way since that terrible night and he would not do so now – not for anything.

Selby stepped in closer and Lisbon could see her whisper something to Jane, and Jane staring back into her eyes with his own red-rimmed ones. He looked beaten.

Finally Jane turned his eyes on the heartless photograph of his daughter's bloody corpse, her flesh splayed out as her mother's had been. He had found them side-by-side, lying together as though in repose, except for the gaping wounds. Jane could still smell the odour of human meat and blood. The air in the bedroom had actually been humid with their body fluids.

Jane could only manage the quickest of glances before his head dropped to his chest powerlessly, and he collapsed forward, falling into the small privacy of his arms folded on the wood ledge of the witness box, his shoulders shaking in silent, man-sized sobs.

"What do you miss about your daughter, Mister Jane?" Selby asked. "What do you miss about Charlotte?"

His face still hidden, Jane shook his head back and forth. "No." He said, his voice a keen of grief, "I wo - I _can't_ talk about h-her."

For the benefit of the jury Selby said loudly "You must." She urged, and then leaned in and said for his ears only "_Don't_ let the bastard win."

Jane tried to calm himself, sitting straighter in his chair, his chin to his chest, tears still streaming but speaking quietly and quickly so as to get the whole ordeal over-with as fast as possible before he fell to pieces from the sorrow. "When I came home from work in the evening, she would take me to her room and show me what she'd done that day in school – what she drawn or learned. Sometimes we'd talk for a half hour or more, it was...our time." He sniffed loudly. "That was always the best part of my day."

His eyes screwed shut and the tears flowed fast and furious, but Jane seemed to be okay with it. He was beyond caring what anyone thought now. Let them look. "Losing them will a-always be the w-worst day of my life. Charlotte – Strawberry - was the only perfect thing I ever accomplished. It's my fault she's dead. They died because of me."

"And since then," Selby encouraged, "you have hunted the man who murdered them?"

"Yes."

"You've made mistakes."

"Yes."

"When you confronted the man Timothy Carter, when you realized or at the time thought, that he was Red John, what happened there? What happened to _you_?"

"Lisbon's...Agent Lisbon's words went through my head. That maybe bringing him to justice would be enough. Maybe I was wrong to want to him dead, but...he told me how my daughter_ smelled_. He _knew_ that – and he _shouldn't _have known that if he was not Red John." Jane whispered it as though it were a profound and terrible and hurtful betrayal of his position as a father. Only daddies should know how their precious child should smell. "Strawberries - her hair, the shampoo, it was strawberries, and he should _not_ have known that."

Jane, examining his fingers, puzzled, still trying to work it all out, audibly whispered it again because up to that moment he still did not understand why Timothy Carter would know such a thing, especially since they had discovered that Carter supposedly had no connection at all to Red John. "He knew how she smelled." He said. "How could he know that if he was not the killer? He _had_ to be Red John, he _had_ to be...so I...so despite what Agent Lisbon said, he _needed_ to die." Jane took another shaky breath. The courtroom was hot and stuffy and he felt squeezed-in. "Because..."

"Because..._what?"_ Selby was fascinated and pleased by this surprising and useful to their case turning-of-the-cards.

"Because I remembered..." Jane took a deep breath, his memories of his slaughtered child fading once more and the focus of his mind again on his single quest to hunt Red John down if it was the last thing he ever did, "how Red John managed to get an accomplice into the CBI offices. Rebecca Demarco had worked there for over a year before she murdered Agent Bosco and his team, and Sherriff Hardy had been at his post for years before Red John used him to kidnap that girl and try to murder me.

"And there were others...others Red John used to hurt people over and over. There would always be someone Red John had in his control to...get to me or to those I care about." Jane slumped. He was exhausted. "And it occurred to me: What jail would ever hold him? If he can get to a sheriff and into the CBI offices and elsewhere...how long would he remain in prison before he escaped?" Jane looked over at the jury once, and then down at his hands, and finally at his lawyer. "So I decided to shoot that son-of-a-bitch."

"No matter the consequences to yourself?"

"Yes, no matter the consequences. The only thing is..."

"What?"

"I don't remember pulling the trigger."

Selby looked surprised for the second time. This bit of information she had evidently not expected either. "You were out of your mind?"

"I...I don't know..." Jane shook his head, his memories over the event apparently not as clear as they all had once assumed. "I don't know, but I remember standing in that cafe', and suddenly I could smell my daughter's shampoo." His face threatened to fold in on itself again in grief, but taking a few seconds and a couple of deep breaths, he managed to shake it off. "I smelled her hair, and I _knew_ I had to kill him."

Selby leaned in and audibly thanked her client. She turned to the judge. "Our defence stands, your honour. Not guilty by reason of temporary insanity."

Gilpin asked the prosecutor. "Mister Williams, do you wish to cross?"

Selby smiled to herself and Cho whispered loudly enough for Lisbon to hear. "Fat chance. Williams would have the jury turning on him like a rabid dog if he tried to question Jane now."

Lisbon agreed. "He's experienced enough to know it could sway the jury to Jane's side. A crying man is a heart-breaker. _Attacking_ that crying man could turn the jury against the prosecution."

Williams stood respectfully. "Ahem. No your Honour. No questions."

Jane vacated the witness stand to his retake his seat beside his lawyer, and Lisbon watched his every lethargic step. His public humiliation was complete. Jane's personal tragedy was gossip for the county, a sordid tale for the viewers to chew over until the next gory horror made the six o'clock news.

CBI

Selby joined Lisbon and Cho outside the courtroom in the hall for a brief fifteen minute recess before closing statements. Selby expressed her concerns. "I'm not sure it will be enough." She looked over to where Jane sat apart from them in a hard chair against the rich cherry-wood wall, sipping tea someone had brought him.

Lisbon's head swam with all the new things she had learned today about her often secretive but loyal employee. Some of the things she wished she could one day forget, except for the sight of Jane sobbing like a child over his murdered family. Somehow that image, however heart-wrenching, solidified in her mind his deep humanity and frailty as an individual, a side of him which she had always suspected but which he had often hid away. In a weird, twisted way, it endeared him to her beyond measure. "What do you mean?" Lisbon asked.

Selby sipped her own coffee, black-two-sugars. "I mean it may not be enough to convince the jury. They sympathise but Williams is going to demand they be objective and if Jane's breakdown didn't twist their hearts hard enough, they'll do it. People are essentially suckers for the Law."

Lisbon couldn't help but hear Jane's voice in Selby's words. Jane was not a stickler about the Law either. He wanted justice. Ironically he often tried to get it by performing a lot of little injustices as he went along. "What are his chances?" Lisbon asked, looking for hope.

"If we're lucky?" Selby asked rhetorically "Fifty-fifty."

CBI

Closing statements were made, Williams speaking of justice and Law and the wrongs of taking the law into one's own hands no matter the compelling reasons, and that though Jane was a fine investigator he was still a cold-hearted man motivated by personal vengeance and wasn't it obvious that he was not insane? Troubled perhaps but not insane at all. No he was guilty of murder and the jury should so find!

Selby's closing statement was sort and simple. She asked the jury to examine Patrick Jane, and not just the cold, bare facts of the case. Examine him as one human being to another, as one frail, breakable person to another who had already been broken. Examine Patrick and what led Patrick to his actions on the day in question and the killing of Joshua Neil. Remember that Mister Jane's psychiatric history and the on-going anguish of his personal story. Selby asked them to keep in close in mind that a violent serial killer was as much hunting Patrick as he was hunting the killer, and the strain that would put on a man. She asked them to remember that Patrick Jane was fail-able and yes he had made mistakes as all humans did, but he was a man driven to madness over the loss of his family and the obsessive need to hunt down those responsible. Selby asked them to remember that though Patrick Jane broke the Law by shooting Joshua Neil, he did so under extreme circumstances, a man under terrible strain and mental pain. Selby told them to remember the testimony of Jane's psychiatrist and that of his colleagues, and to make their decision based on all of these factors, not just the evidence as it was presented, because people and what drives them are more than the hard facts or the circumstances in which they find themselves. People are persons under God and our fellows. "Patrick is not just the investigator or the mental patient or even the killer – he was also someone's son, someone's husband and someone's – a little _girl's_ - father. Thank you for your attention."

Selby sat down. "I hope your fingers are crossed." She said to her client.

As Judge Gilpin droned on about the letter of the Law to the jurors, Jane looked over at his lawyer, then to the judge, then over to the jury and then, finally, he did something Lisbon did not expect. For the first time since the trial began he turned around in his seat and looked directly at her, his expression was inscrutable.

When he turned back around he pushed back his chair and stood up, taking his lawyer by surprise. Selby asked "Patrick? What are you doing?"

Jane said to the judge. "Your Honour, I would like to change my plea."

Gilpin stopped his speeches and stared over his glasses at Selby's client. "Is this some kind of joke, Mister Jane? Closing arguments have already been given."

"Then I would like to make a statement before the jury is excused to deliberate." He insisted. "I am allowed to make a statement aren't I? _I'm_ the one facing jail for the rest of my life."

With one hand Selby was yanking on his jacket sleeve. "Patrick. _What_ are you doing?" When Jane ignored her, she stood. "Excuse me, your Honour, I don't think my client understands –"

"I understand." Jane said, cutting her off. "I want to say something to Judge Gilpin and the jury."

"Ms. Selby, do you mind?" Gilpin said. "He is allowed is he so wishes."

Selby reluctantly sat down, bracing herself for the worst while Gilpin resumed his little talk with Jane. "Indeed you are, Mister Jane." Gilpin said, "In answer to both questions; yes, you are still under oath and, yes, you are allowed to make any statement you wish. Do you wish to take the stand?"

Jane looked over at the lonely witness box, and shook his head once. "No. If I'm still under oath, I can make my statement from here can't I?"

Gilpin nodded solemnly, folding his hands in front of him. "If you like."

Jane rubbed the tips of his right fingers across the table and then forced them to his sides as he spoke. "Then I'd like to say that I knew Joshua Neil." He paused "But I never knew him as Joshua Neil, only as Josh. I met him once. He was the man Red John hired to beat me."

Gilpin sat up. "I see."

"There's more." Jane said.

Gilpin waved a hand. "Go on Mister Jane."

"My blood and DNA was found on the belt buckle because that was the belt Red John used to cut the bottoms of my feet. The fingerprints were on the gun because, yes, it was my gun, but Red John took it from me when I was in San Francisco trying to find him...to kill him. Only I...failed to accomplish that. Red John drugged me and drove me back to Sacramento, dumping me off by the CBI offices with a warning to never try to find him again, and that he would punish me for doing so. It is my belief that Red John then killed Josh and planted the gun beneath his body as a punishment to me. So I would end up here, and so...so I would have to confess my deceit to save myself."

"To what deceit specifically are you referring?" Judge Gilpin asked, now thoroughly engrossed in Patrick Jane's little confession.

"That the second time Red John took me; he didn't really..._take_ me." Jane twisted, almost turning around once more to look at the stricken face of his boss, but forced himself to stay as he was. "I arranged my own disappearance because I was trying to protect my team. Red John had set fire to Agent Van Pelt's apartment and I knew it was going to be just the first of many attempts against the people I work with in order to terrify me...because I care about them and Red John knows that. So I faked my own disappearance to get to him first." Jane said. His voice was filled with regret. "Only I wasn't able to..._kill_ him I mean."

Jane looked around the courtroom. "This whole thing, this trial, is Red John's_ punishment_."

Gilpin asked. "Mister Jane, normally I would leave such a question up to the counsellors at hand, but what proof can you provide that this statement of yours holds any truth?"

"If the FBI forensic team in charge of the Red John files checks room 221 at the San Francisco downtown Hilton, they'll find trace evidence of a murder. A woman, the chamber maid, was killed there by Red John. It was done to hurt me; another of his "punishments", no doubt she has since been reported missing by friends or relatives to the local authorities.

"I believe Joshua Neil was Red John's cleaner, hired by him and brought in to scrub down the room. But if the CSI's look closely, they'll find her blood soaked into the cracks between the bathroom tiles and possibly into the paint on the wall. I guess to find out they'll have to use their glowlie-blue spray stuff...whatever you call it."

"I see." Gilpin said soberly. "Is that all, Mister Jane?"

Jane nodded, and sat down again beside his apoplectic lawyer. "Yes, that's all."

In her seat Lisbon said under her breath. _"Jesus Christ, Jane..."_

Gilpin removed his glasses. "Well, that is an extraordinary statement, Mister Jane, and I can't help but wonder why you waited until the last possible moment to reveal your thoughts but, however much this information may alter any decision regarding your immediate future, that will still be up to the jury to determine."

Gilpin then put a question to both the prosecution and the defence. "In light of this statement, do either of you wish to redress any part of your witnesses testimonies?"

Selby stood. "Yes, your Honour. I would like to recall Doctor Ladal Jalak to the stand."

Doctor Jalak, the Medical Examiner in the case, was recalled and gave further testimony.

Jalak was as useful as Selby had hoped. Well, I am a doctor, Jalak said, though my specialty is in forensics and not family practise but yes, the scars on the bottoms of Mister Jane's feet could have been made with a sharp piece of metal and not only with glass shards or rocks as Mister Jane originally put forward as the cause. Yes, they could be consistent with the sharp metal tooth of a belt buckle, certainly. Was Mister Jane's behaviour that night when he stumbled into CBI badly beaten consistent with not only the injuries sustained but with the possibility of there being drugs still in his system? Yes, that is a possibility, though impossibly to verify now.

At Selby's urgent questions, Jalak continued. Certainly – yes - Mister Jane's injuries were consistent with a severe beating about the head, torso and legs; injuries which could have been caused by fists or feet – boots to be more specific. The cut to Mister Jane's throat, not as wide or as deep as Red John's other victims, could possibly suggest that Red John had not intended to kill Patrick, merely to punish. At any rate, Patrick Jane was left alive, his injuries very bad but ultimately, in Jalak's professional medical opinion, not life threatening.

Selby thanked the doctor and said to the judge. "No more questions, your honour."

Gilpin looked at Williams who shook his head in the negative. "No questions, Judge."

"Am I to understand that both the prosecution and the defence rest from their cases?"

"Yes, your Honour." Williams and Selby answered almost simultaneously.

"Very well." Gilpin then turned his attention to the jury. "The jury is hereby in deliberation from now until they reach a verdict. You shall be escorted to an undisclosed place where you will be kept comfortable until such a time as you have made your decision. The accused, Mister Jane, will also remain in Sacramento until that time."

Gilpin looked at him directly. "Do you understand me, Mister Jane? You will _not_ leave Sacramento until a verdict has been reached and the jury is recalled. At that time you also will be recalled. Do I make myself clear?"

Jane nodded, answering quietly "Yes."

CBI

Jane stood by his lawyer, rocking on his toes, stealing glimpses at Lisbon as she and Cho spoke in low tones some yards away.

"I hope your little surprise in there saves your ass because our insanity defence just went down the toilet." Selby pointed out to Jane. He didn't respond and Selby was enough tuned in to the man by now to know that he had other things on his mind – like his job and where he now stood with his boss, the pushy, sharp-tongued Teresa Lisbon. "Why don't you go talk to her?" Selby suggested. "What's she going to do – shoot you?"

"She _might_." He answered.

Selby said "Look, the deliberating could take a while. In fact, the longer they talk, the better the news will probably be for you, so maybe we should both get hotel rooms nearby or something? I'll make the reservations and we can have some dinner. I'm starving." Selby left to make the arrangements, and Jane wandered over to where Van Pelt had just arrived, joining Lisbon and Cho.

Lisbon didn't look at him as he approached them. Van Pelt, true to her form, impulsively embraced him in a warm hug. "Hi Jane." She said.

Jane smiled and gently disengaged himself from her strong arms. "Hi."

Cho asked. "How ya' doing?"

Jane shrugged again, a habitual gesture that had lately turned into a nervous tic'. "Wondering if prison food has improved in the last year. _You?"_

Cho was thinking of something to say to that when without warning Jane turned to the very silent and angry Lisbon, speaking quickly, his words tumbling out like candy from broken a gumball machine. "Lisbon, I wouldn't have lied to you if I knew things were going to turn out the way they did. I wouldn't have - I _promise_ you that. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I was just trying to protect the team."

Lisbon looked back at him, nodding perfunctorily, as though she had heard such and more a thousand times. "I know. You were just doing what you thought was right." But she was not going to let him off so easily. "You were just doing what you always do – playing the martyr or the lone wolf and almost getting yourself _killed_. Well, I gotta' tell you, Jane, what you think is right isn't always what's _best_." She snapped. "For _any _of us."

With one angry fist, Lisbon grabbed his jacket-sleeve and pulled him aside, away from the earshot of the others. "Well, I've had it with you using that excuse for the reckless endangerment of your own life – using _us_. I don't – _we _don't care about your quest for revenge or your desire for wild-west justice – we only care about _you_. God help me, we still _actually _care, so if you still want this job -_ if_ you manage to stay out of jail that is – then from now on, you'll be partnered up as a matter of course; every damn day until you retire. No going off alone, no lying, and no more of this lone wolf crap or right now go pack up your goddamn desk and _quit!"_

Lisbon let a wave of sadness cross her delicate features that said so much more. Disappointment over what he had done plus fear over what might happen to him next if he was taken away from her for good. "Because I can't go through this every week anymore." She said to him. "I _can't_." It was her turn to shrug. Let him interpret it as he may. "It hurts too much."

Jane looked back at his angry, hurt but still forgiving boss and friend, so grateful that he had met this woman. So lucky to have her backing him up and saving him when required, and scolding him when he needed it, and teasing him gently when he _really_ needed it. "I'm sorry." _I never wanted to hurt you. Not ever!_

CBI

"We the jury in the case of the State of California against the accused Mister Patrick Jane of Sacramento of the charge of Murder in the first degree, find the defendant Not Guilty."

Gilpin added a recommendation to Jane of voluntary psychiatric counselling, to which suggestion Jane just smiled politely.

Selby lingered behind to shake Williams' hand. "Good fight out there, Henry."

"You got lucky." He said, and Selby laughed. "Hah! You _wish_." Then followed her client who was already out in the hallway where his friends had gathered to slap him on the back.

When Selby approached the little group of CBI agents and their consultant enjoying his new freedom, Jane excused himself to the men's room. Selby watched his stiffly retreating back with a twist of her lip, and remarked to Lisbon. "He thinks he resents me _now_? Wait 'till he gets my bill."

Selby could well understand his feelings toward her, and the cool reception she had received from them all after seeing Jane's breakdown in the witness box. Anger from a client or his friends and family was par for the course for a defence or prosecuting attorney alike. Sometimes to win, you had to be a bitch.

"Sorry about him." Lisbon said by way of an apology. "He thinks you're a...um...terrible person."

Selby caught the undercurrent in the meaning. Lisbon thought the same. Selby smiled indulgently. "Lucky for him, though, I'm a shit-hot defence lawyer. Goodbye Agent Lisbon and good luck. I have a feeling you'll need it." Selby said in parting.

Lisbon said to her team. "Let's go get some food, I'm hungry and Jane's buying."

"No I'm not." He said, back from the washroom in time to see his lawyer walking away, and then obediently following his petite, raven-haired goddess to whichever restaurant she chose. "You think I'm made of money?" He asked.

"You sure got more of it than _me_." Lisbon answered with a huff.

"Not with the money _you_ pay me."

"Take it up with Bertram." Lisbon said.

"Thanks, I will. How much do you make, by the way?" Jane inquired.

"Hah. None of your business."

"You know I can easily find out, Lisbon, so you may as well just _tell_ me."

Lisbon lamented "I should have brought my gun."

"You would never shoot me, Lisbon. You keep denying it, but you know you love me." Jane countered.

Lisbon sighed wearily. "Cho, do you have _your_ gun?"

CBI-END


End file.
